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The Competitive Cliff
Grow or Die, there's no third direction.
The Competitive Cliff is the concept that every company must constantly learn to serve their Buyers better today than yesterday or they will not survive, their Buyers leaving them for better alternatives.
The Buyer alone determines which businesses survive. Buyer preferred alternatives survive the Competitive Cliff; Buyer rejects fall off it. That which the Buyer likes, they buy more of. That which they don’t like, they buy less of.
Survival Time
All time available to the Buyer is time spent in ensuring their survival; there is no free time, extra time, spare time; all time goes towards Survival or towards Demise according to the Law of the Competitive Cliff.
The Expert Seller who understands who this Buyer is, the pressure they are under, and who is willing and able to provide solution expertise curated for the Buyer's problem, is the Mission Partner the Buyer is always open to considering.
Clearly Superior Alternative
The Clearly Superior Alternative is an option which the Buyer has learned is an obviously and significantly better solution to their specific problem than other competitive options.
It is a Superior Alternative to anything available.
And it is Clearly so as it is identified through rigorous proof, and validated by staff, peers and leadership.
Competitive Equilibrium
Competitive Equilibrium is when Buyers do not see a Clearly Superior Alternative amongst a group of competitive alternatives; the competition then becomes one of price.
An excellent solution is easily made to appear no better than the others by a sales approach which delivers an experience the Buyer loathes.
An advantage that massively disrupts the market, can be one delivered by a buying experience the Buyer likes.
Dominant Value Provider
The Dominant Value Provider is a Clearly Superior Alternative to a majority of Buyers within the market. Buyer preference drives the Dominant Value Provider safely up the Competitive Cliff, while their abandoned competitors decline and fall from it. How to become a Dominant Value Provider? Find a large group of Buyers who are getting what they don’t want, and offer them a Clearly Superior Alternative.
And when a lot of Buyers hate the buying experience they get from the market, a Dominant Value Provider can arise simply from giving them a buying experience they like. And that is exactly the opportunity which exists today.
Competitive Cliff Reality
The Global Digital Transformation provides unprecedented mobility to the Buyer, allowing them to easily uncouple from a lesser alternative provider and rapidly implement a Clearly Superior Alternative.
The only way for any company to survive the Competitive Cliff, is to attract, and keep, Buyers. And the only way to do that is to be a better alternative to the Buyer, a Clearly Superior Alternative. Delivering more value, and a better experience, than is available from any other alternative.
Law of Inevitable Extinction (LIE)
Companies that oppose their Buyer's interests in any way, view them as revenue first, constrain their choices and manipulate them to purchase, will not survive the Competitive Cliff, as their Buyers drop them for their competitors.
Companies that deliver experiences which their Buyers do not like, end up without those Buyers.
Question: if the Buyer hates the buying experience the salesperson is giving them, why would they think the experience as a Customer of the company will be any better?
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