Strategy Canvas
Visualise how your venture's value proposition compares against competitors across the factors buyers actually weigh
12 min · W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne, developed alongside Blue Ocean Strategy
What is this framework?
A strategy canvas plots how your venture and competitors perform on the key factors customers use to choose between them, drawn as a line graph. It reveals whether your offering genuinely diverges from rivals or simply follows the same curve as everyone else.
The strategy canvas is the diagnostic tool behind Blue Ocean Strategy. Along the horizontal axis sit the factors an industry competes on and invests in — price, speed, variety, personalisation, and so on. Along the vertical axis is the relative offering level, from low to high.
Each competitor, including your own venture, becomes a line connecting its score on every factor. When all lines follow roughly the same shape, the industry is competing on the same terms and margins tend to be thin. A venture that wants to stand out should aim for a value curve with a distinctly different shape, not just slightly higher scores everywhere.
The canvas is most useful as a diagnostic before designing a new offering and again afterwards to check whether the intended differentiation is visible on paper, not just in the founder's head.
What problem does it help solve?
- See whether your venture's factors genuinely differ in shape from competitors, not just in degree
- Identify factors the whole industry over-invests in without customer benefit
- Communicate strategic differentiation visually to a team or investor
- Decide which factors to focus resources on rather than trying to win on everything
The framework
Score your venture and two competitors from 1 (low) to 5 (high) on each factor and compare the resulting curves.
Every part explained
Identify competing factors
List the factors the industry competes on and invests resources in.
Ask: What factors does this industry typically compete on?
Example: A food delivery market competes on price, delivery speed, menu range, and app convenience.
Score each competitor
Rate every serious competitor, including your own venture, on each factor.
Ask: How would a typical customer rate this competitor from low to high on each factor?
Example: A premium delivery app scores high on speed and personalisation but low on price.
Draw the value curve
Connect each competitor's scores into a line to visualise its overall shape.
Ask: Does this competitor's curve look distinct, or does it follow the industry norm?
Example: Three delivery apps show nearly identical curves, revealing a crowded, undifferentiated market.
Spot the divergence opportunity
Look for factors where every competitor scores similarly and low.
Ask: Which factor does everyone underinvest in that customers actually care about?
Example: All food delivery apps score low on order customisation, suggesting an opportunity.
Design a divergent curve
Deliberately raise some factors, lower others, to create a genuinely different shape.
Ask: What shape do I want my curve to have that no competitor currently has?
Example: A new entrant lowers range but raises personalisation and speed, creating a distinct curve.
Worked example — A student-run tutoring platform
Two students plot a strategy canvas comparing their venture with two existing tuition options.
Factors chosen
Price, Convenience, Personalisation, Speed, Range, Service
Tuition Centre A score
Price 2, Convenience 3, Personalisation 2, Speed 2, Range 5, Service 4
Tuition Centre B score
Price 3, Convenience 3, Personalisation 3, Speed 3, Range 3, Service 3
Our venture score
Price 4, Convenience 5, Personalisation 5, Speed 4, Range 2, Service 3
Observation
Centres A and B follow a similar curve; our venture diverges sharply on convenience and personalisation
Trade-off accepted
We deliberately score low on range, offering only core first-year subjects
Decision
Lead marketing with convenience and personalisation, not trying to compete on range
The canvas confirmed the venture's differentiation was real and visible, not just a slogan, because its curve shape genuinely diverged from both competitors.
How to use it
- 1List five to seven factors the industry competes on.
- 2Identify two or three real competitors to compare against.
- 3Score each competitor from 1 to 5 on every factor based on customer perception.
- 4Score your own venture, current or planned, on the same factors.
- 5Draw or plot the resulting curves and compare their shapes.
- 6Highlight where your curve diverges and where it merely mirrors competitors.
- 7Redesign factors deliberately to increase divergence where it matters to customers.
Try it yourself
Score your venture and two competitors from 1 to 5 on each factor.
Price
Convenience
Personalisation
Speed
Range
Service
Your work stays on this device. Nothing is uploaded, so use the same browser to come back to it.
When to use it
- After drafting a value proposition, to check it visually differs from competitors
- Before a pitch, to communicate differentiation clearly
- When deciding where to focus limited resources rather than trying to win on every factor
When not to rely on it
This framework does not prove:
- • Scores are subjective estimates unless backed by real customer research
- • It captures a snapshot in time; competitors can shift their curve quickly
- • It does not account for factors that are hard to quantify, such as brand trust
Common mistakes
- Scoring your own venture generously without checking against real customer perception
- Choosing too many factors, which makes the canvas cluttered and unclear
- Aiming to score highest on every factor instead of accepting deliberate trade-offs
Connections
Related concepts
Related frameworks
Quick check
What does it mean if your venture's value curve looks almost identical to every competitor's?
Remember this
A strategy canvas exposes whether your differentiation is real by comparing the shape of value curves, not just their scores.