Focus on the Competition or on the Customer?
Comparing Microsoft to Apple is a common exercise, and I just read another analysis of why Microsoft is not improving profits and marketshare, but Apple is amazing us. However, the conclusion the author came to is different than my own conclusion.
The problem with organizations is that it is easier to focus on internal politics because the culprits are right in front of you. Of course, this mires the organization in a zero progress game. Everyone is poised to prevent internal disruption of their carefully balanced power base. The bigger the organization, the bigger the problem of internal politics constraining and consuming the creative resources of the organization.
Some analysts think that a fanatical focus on the competition is the difference between Microsoft and Apple. They are wrong.
Focus on the Competition Does Not Improve Results
If you shift the focus to the competition, you are plotting for small advantages in a world where the competitors are one step ahead of you. This will not lead to breakthroughs, and IMHO will spiral down a rabbit hole to mediocrity and “me too-ism.”
Focus on the Customer Renders Breakthrough
However, if you shift the focus to the customer, you have the opportunity to notice something overlooked by the competition. If you focus on the customer, you will be examining the root of the purchase decision, not your competitors interpretation of that purchase decision. You prevent being misguided by a competitors false interpretation if you stay focused on the customer and only monitor the competitor’s responses.
Apple demonstrates this beautifully, with offerings no competitor had invented. Microsoft, well, not so much. They seem to weigh down products with a clear offering, layering on “inventions” from other parts of the organization so that the final product is hard to distinguish from previous offerings and just too muddled to be amazing. Too bad, because the brains at Microsoft are no less brilliant than the brains at Apple. But the environments are very different.
Proposals are Opportunities for Breakthrough Invention
When I’m working on a proposal, I spend little or no time gathering competitor intelligence. Most of it is gossip and innuendo, some of it is just plain incorrect. Instead, we spend time focused on the customer. What keeps them up at night? What part of their mission can we improve? How does our work move the customer forward?
The breakthroughs always come during these discussions. The creative twist that attracts the customer to our proposal comes out in these brainstorming sessions.
The only thing generated by competitor analysis is fear and trepidation, so I avoid it.
My hit rate is solid at 85 percent and going up with this last year’s wins. I’ve kept this level of performance ever since I started using this approach. Might be worth a try.
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