RESULT OBTAINED
Canonical method
Value curve: comparing what the offers really favour
What must be established
A useful analysis keeps its controls visible.
- 01
Build the factors from the criteria actually used by the buyers and the alternatives.
- 02
Define a common scale and document each level assigned.
- 03
Test the factors to reduce, eliminate, raise or create with distinct evidence.
Decision reference
Make the next choice more explicit.
DECISION SUPPORTED
In which factors do the offers invest, and which differences remain visible to the buyer?
DELIVERABLE TO KEEP
A comparative curve that makes convergence, divergence and assumptions to test visible.
NEXT ELEMENT TO EXAMINE
Positioning mapExplore →Choose the factors
The factors must describe what the industry offers and what the buyer trades off. A list built only from internal characteristics creates a self-centred map.
- Purchase criterion
- Alternative
- Cost or effort
- Experience
Make the scale verifiable
Each level must have a definition and a source. A scale from 1 to 5 remains ordinal and does not prove that a two-point gap is worth twice as much.
- Definition of the levels
- Source
- Date
- Uncertainty
Formulate a hypothesis
The divergence of the curve is only a positioning hypothesis. It must be confronted with non-customers, costs and the capabilities required.
- Expected benefit
- Targeted non-customer
- Cost
- Test
DECISION ASSET
Canvas of the factors of competition
The grid compares offer levels on explicitly defined and sourced factors.
Factor
- Input
- Trade-off criterion
- Control
- Is it visible to the buyer?
- Output
- Comparison axis
Current level
- Input
- Offer and alternatives
- Control
- Which evidence supports the score?
- Output
- Comparable curves
Divergence
- Input
- Reduce, create, raise
- Control
- Which benefit is expected?
- Output
- Hypothesis
Validation
- Input
- Cost, adoption, non-customer
- Control
- Which test could refute it?
- Output
- Protocol
- Strategy Canvas, Blue Ocean Strategy (opens in a new tab)Official source of the strategy canvas and the value curve.
- Blue Ocean Toolkit 2025 (opens in a new tab)Definitions and uses of the canvas in the method published by its authors.
MOVE FROM ANALYSIS TO YOUR DECISION
Test the preference, credibility and defence of the positioning
MOVE FROM ANALYSIS TO YOUR DECISION
Test the preference, credibility and defence of the positioning
RETURN TO THE DECISION SYSTEM
See the canonical definition of marketing strategy→