The Unicist Competitive Strategy is a business approach that focuses on developing and sustaining competitive advantages in the marketplace. It is based on the understanding that the success of a business is not only determined by its internal capabilities but also by its ability to adapt and differentiate itself in a changing and competitive environment. Each competitive strategy has its unicist functionalist principles that define its success. The alternative strategies to confront the market are the following:

Influence Building Confrontation: This confrontation occurs when competitors in a market face a dominant participant. Competitors utilize different strategies to avoid being overshadowed in the market and increase their influence to conquer niches. These strategies may include complementing the dominant’s products on their weaknesses, forward integration, developing a marginal niche strategy, and competing based on personal subjective relations.

Ethical Niche Confrontation: This confrontation is a natural way to introduce new concepts into a market. It involves the integration with customers, association with clients, and sharing profits with clients. The ethical niche confrontation is used to disrupt the dominance of existing competitors or to defend against powerful newcomers entering a segment.

Survival Confrontation: This confrontation occurs when a market defendant is being attacked by a conqueror who seeks to surpass them in the consumer’s mind. The defendant must defend their position and fend off the conqueror’s attacks by sustaining market niches through functional or ethical differentiation. Survival confrontations involve defending attacked spaces and require developing strong communication strategies and utilizing word-of-mouth communication.

Ideological Niche Confrontation: This confrontation is used to enter a market with differentiated value propositions. It involves undermining the ethical position of the market leader to enter a niche and maintain and expand it to other niches and segments. The ideological niche confrontation requires a product that is more functional than the dominant leader’s, has a superior ethic, operates at a faster speed, and relies on a compact team working together.

Annulment Confrontation: This type of confrontation focuses on nullifying or neutralizing the actions and strategies of competitors. It involves countering or undermining the competitive efforts of rivals to gain an advantage in the market.

Dominance Confrontation: This type of confrontation aims to establish dominance in the market by outperforming competitors in terms of market share, sales, and profitability. The goal is to become the clear leader in the market and maintain a strong competitive position.

Conquest Confrontation: This type of confrontation involves aggressively targeting and capturing market share from competitors. It focuses on expanding the customer base and gaining market dominance through aggressive marketing and sales tactics.

Obstructing Confrontation: This type of confrontation focuses on obstructing or hindering the activities and progress of competitors. It may involve creating barriers to entry, blocking distribution channels, or undermining the reputation and credibility of competitors.

Supremacy Confrontation: This type of confrontation aims to establish absolute supremacy and control in the market. It involves dominating the entire value chain, from production to distribution, and maintaining a position of unrivaled power and influence.

Outsiders Confrontation: This type of confrontation involves challenging and disrupting the established players in the market. It focuses on introducing innovative and disruptive solutions that offer superior value to customers, often coming from outside the industry.

These confrontations represent different strategies and approaches that businesses can use to compete effectively in the market. They vary in terms of their goals and tactics but ultimately aim to gain a competitive advantage and achieve market success.

The Unicist Research Institute