10 types of challenger brand strategy

What do we need to challenge to succeed?

A challenger is not a brand that challenges somebody, but a brand that challenges something. Very few explicitly take on another brand in their category, but all of them are challenging something they feel needs to change.

Lemonade challenges people’s historical relationship with insurance.

Tony’s Chocolonely challenges the ethics of the chocolate category.

Universal Standard challenges a lack of inclusivity and bias in fashion.

Xiaomi challenges why the best technology has to be expensive.

COPA90 challenges how the existing power structure shortchanges football fans.

Oatly challenges whether a historical and much-loved cultural norm is something any of us should be doing at all any more.

Understanding that central challenge gives each of these challengers real strategic clarity – clarity on their positioning, on their culture, and on their communications behaviour.

And we can see in this clarity a critical antidote to a common tendency in marketers today to respond to a fast-changing world by focusing on the wrong things – the new shiny object, conference buzzword or a slavish adherence to Purpose, whether it is right for the brand or not – rather than the core elements of strategy and brand-building that will drive competitive differentiation.

A drift that is dangerous for a market leader, and fatal to a challenger.

Let’s see what follows, then, as 10 different kinds of challenger clarity.

Overthrow II, by eatbigfish. and PHD Worldwide, explores 10 of the most powerful strategies and mindsets used by today’s challengers to disrupt their markets. Get your copy at overthrow2.com.

eatbigfish. is a strategic brand consultancy whose unique focus is challenger thinking and behaviour. Our expertise is grounded in The Challenger Project - our study of how Challenger Brands succeed by doing more with less.

We act as catalysts rather than consultants, and through our collaborative approach we provide inspiration and frameworks which enable ‘would be’ challengers to deliver breakthrough solutions for their teams and brand.

If you would like to speak to someone please call or email our local representative for Africa Middle East: Delta Victor Bravo (Pty) Ltd.

Contact David Blyth – moc.hsifgibtae@divad
Telephone: +27 71 483 8514