Market Challenger Strategies
Usually these firms are the second, third, or lower in an industry. These runner-up firms may adopt one of two competitive following strategies:
- They may challenge the leader and other competitors for more market share (market challengers) in an aggressive bid.
- They may play along with competitors and not rock the boat (market followers. A market challenger has to first define the strategic objective and competitor. The market challenger has to decide from among the following strategies:
a. Attack the leader.
b. Avoid the leader.
c. Attack other firms.
d. Acquire smaller firms.
Selecting an attack strategy. The options available are following:
A). Frontal attack. Strong challengers sometimes match the market leader's manufacture, , price, advertising and distribution efforts. It strength instead of weaknesses.
b). Indirect attack. Attack on competitive weaknesses or on gaps in the competitor's market coverage.
c). Diversify into unrelated manufacture or leapfrog into new technologies to replace present products.