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January 18, 2024, vizologi

Your Guide to Drawing a Strategic Canvas Easy!

Do you want to create a strategic canvas but don’t know where to start? Drawing a strategic canvas can be easier with the right guidance.

In this article, we’ll give you a simple and easy guide on how to draw a strategic canvas. Whether you’re a beginner or need a refresher, we’ve got you covered.

So, grab your drawing materials and get ready to bring your strategic ideas to life!

Understanding the Strategy Canvas

What’s a Strategy Canvas?

The strategy canvas includes the horizontal axis and the vertical axis.

The horizontal axis displays the key competition factors.

The vertical axis indicates the offering level for each factor.

To draw a good strategy canvas, do the following:

  1. Name the industry.
  2. Identify the key competitive factors.
  3. Rate the relative offering level of each factor on a 5-point scale.
  4. Connect the dots to create the strategic profile or value curve.

Successful businesses use a strategy canvas to show how market leaders deliver offering levels across each factor.

This helps create a visual representation of each player’s strategic profile.

By comparing one’s own business offering to industry leaders or strong competitors, areas for improvement or innovation can be identified.

Key Parts of the Strategy Canvas

Who’s Playing the Game?

When drawing a strategic canvas, start by identifying who is involved in playing the game. Players in an industry compete on factors like price, quality, customer service, and innovation. These factors determine the competitiveness and success of each player. Plot the offering level delivered by market leaders across each factor to create a strategic profile or value curve for each player.

This visual analysis of the competitive landscape allows businesses to make informed strategic decisions based on the strengths and weaknesses of their competitors.

Factors We’re Competing On

Companies compete on factors like price, quality, innovation, and customer service. Each industry has its own key competitive factors. Assessing performance can be done through research, surveys, and comparing with competitors. Differentiation is achieved by excelling in these factors, offering unique features, efficient service, or lower prices. This helps companies gain a competitive edge and attract customers. It’s important for a company to stand out from others in the industry.

How Do We Score?

To score on a strategy canvas, plot the market leaders’ offering levels for each factor and connect the dots to draw their strategic profiles or value curves. Factors that contribute to scoring include price, quality, customer service, innovation, convenience, and brand reputation.

Improving the scoring involves enhancing the offering level for each factor. This can be achieved by improving product or service quality, aligning pricing with the market, investing in technology and innovation, providing exceptional customer service, and building a strong brand reputation.

Drawing Your Strategy Canvas

What Does a Good Canvas Look Like?

An effective canvas clearly shows the competition factors and market leaders’ offerings. By connecting the dots, it reveals the strategic profile of each player, making the competitive landscape visible. Stakeholders can then understand the relative offering levels across different factors.

A successful canvas highlights relevant competitive factors and communicates the strategic plan to stakeholders. It showcases how a company or product stands out against competitors. This approach can be adapted to various industries by adjusting the key competitive factors.

Using a 5-point scale to rate each factor’s offering level, the canvas provides an objective view of the competitive landscape. This makes it a useful tool for strategic planning and decision-making across different sectors.

The Four Actions to Change Your Game Plan

Things to Add In

When drawing a strategy canvas, it’s important to include the industry name for context. This helps differentiate between different markets. Identify the key competitive factors on the horizontal axis. Then, accurately rate the relative offering level of each factor on the vertical axis.

This allows for an accurate drawing of the current strategic profile or value curve. When changing the game plan, it’s important to remove outdated factors that are no longer relevant in the industry. Replace them with new, emerging factors.

By regularly revisiting and updating the canvas, a company can ensure that its strategic profile stays relevant and aligned with the current market. For instance, an established car manufacturer might need to focus on traditional factors like safety and fuel efficiency. They could also incorporate newer factors such as connectivity and autonomous driving technology to stay competitive.

What to Cut Down

To decide what to cut down on the strategy canvas, one must carefully consider the key factors of competition. For example, in evaluating an industry, prioritizing factors like price, quality, service, and brand reputation is important. Then, rating the relative offering level of each factor on a 5-point scale, considering the competition, can help identify areas for potential reduction in investment.

Connecting the dots of the offering levels delivered by market leaders across each factor creates a strategic profile for the business. Comparing this against the best player in the industry or the strongest competitor reveals where reductions can be made.

To replace the elements that are being cut down, new strategies and potential innovation should be considered. This might involve investing in new technology, improving customer service processes, or enhancing product offerings to maintain a competitive advantage.

New Stuff to Bring In

Introducing new items or products that meet the main factors of competition can change the game plan and improve the strategic canvas.

Identifying and introducing new offerings that align with these factors can help businesses stand out and create a unique value proposition for customers.

For instance, a transportation company might introduce eco-friendly vehicles to address environmental impact, thus changing the strategic canvas.

This can attract new customers, retain existing ones, and gain a competitive edge in the market.

Introducing new products or services can also increase market share and revenue growth, ultimately reshaping the value curve and strategic profile of the business.

Continuously bringing in new items that align with the main competitive factors can help companies stay relevant and competitive in their industry.

What to Get Rid Of

When drawing a strategic canvas, it’s important to identify and consider removing items or actions that are no longer producing positive results. Outdated or redundant elements that no longer add value to the current strategy should also be eliminated.

Additionally, aspects of the current strategy or approach that are no longer effective should be identified and removed to improve overall performance. By optimizing the strategic canvas and removing such elements, businesses can streamline their approach and better position themselves within their industry.

For example, a company may realize that certain product features are no longer valued by customers and can be removed to simplify the product offering. Similarly, a marketing strategy that includes outdated channels or messaging may need to be removed to make way for more effective tactics.

Learning from Examples

The [yellow tail] Wine Success Story

The [yellow tail] Wine success story focused on important parts of the strategy canvas. It considered competition and the offering level for those factors.

To succeed in the wine industry, [yellow tail] Wine changed its game plan. It offered high-quality wine at a lower price point than traditional competitors. Also, it focused on consumer education and creative branding strategies.

By competing on factors like pricing, consumer education, and branding, [yellow tail] Wine stood out in the market. It appealed to a broad consumer base. This strategic shift gave [yellow tail] Wine a unique position in the wine industry. It gained widespread recognition and success.

How Southwest Airlines Does It

Southwest Airlines sets itself apart in the airline industry by using specific strategies. One important factor is providing affordable airfare. This is shown in the company’s strategic canvas, which positions Southwest as a leader in low-cost air travel.

Additionally, the company excels in customer service, on-time performance, and point-to-point routes. These strategies help Southwest maintain a unique appeal to travelers.

Vizologi is a revolutionary AI-generated business strategy tool that offers its users access to advanced features to create and refine start-up ideas quickly.
It generates limitless business ideas, gains insights on markets and competitors, and automates business plan creation.

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Zero to One by Peter Thiel.
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