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An Exhaustive List Of How Jason Lemkin Approaches Competitive Strategy

An Exhaustive List Of How Jason Lemkin Approaches Competitive Strategy

+ Lessons from Leading Competitive Intel at Oracle, AWS, and Databricks

Andy McCotter-Bicknell
July 20, 2023 • Estimated Reading Time: 9 minutes

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Jason Lemkin is a legend.

Co-Founded Nanogram Devices (acq’d by market leader for $50M)
Co-founded Echosign (acq’d by Adobe for hundreds of millions)
Founded SaaStr where he’s:
- invested in dozens of successful startups
- built a social community of 500k+ SaaS founders and execs

He writes about competitive strategy a lot too—I’m talking hundreds of tweets, blogs, and posts.

So I binged it all, summarized the advice that jumped out to me, and categorized them into two lists: tips for Founders & CEOs, and tips for Sales & Marketing.

Here ya go!

Top 10 Tips for Founders & CEOs:

The best CEOs respect & understand the competition cold.
Build relationships with competitor CEOs.
If you’re not growing at least as fast as competitors, it’s a “you” problem. Don’t blame the market.
Integrate with and open your API to your competitors. Make it easy for customers to buy both you and your competitor together.
If you’re growing at a decent rate, competitors can’t really kill you.
When pitching to VCs, spend extra time on “competition” & “why we win” slides. And no, these shouldn’t be feature comparisons.
You need a 10x feature that competitors don’t have in order to win consistently. You can’t just be the cheaper option.
FUD and competition bashing can work, but it can also blow up in your face if you’re not good at it.
It’s ok to hire a couple sellers & VPs from competitors, but not much more. Why? Because it’s easy to assume they’re better than they are.
How to check on a competitor’s growth plan: Search on LinkedIn how many sales reps they have, then multiply by $500,000. That’s how much in booking they plan to add this year.

Top 10 Tips for Sales & Marketing:

The best sales reps respect the competition.
Ask your prospects what competitors they’re looking at.
Assume the competition is cold calling your customers.
Create a dedicated sales & marketing “steal team” to win big against specific competitors.
Used properly, discounting creates urgency to close. But it rarely beats competitors.
Learn to do buy-out deals.
Track when competitors’ customers are up for renewal. Then proactively reach out to them as that time comes closer.
When the market is good, push for the biggest deal possible and box competitors out.
Until you’re clearly #1, your homepage should plainly list the 3 things you do better than the competition.
Mass spam-style SDR cadences can actually help force a vendor into a competitive deal. But they only work when they’re timed right.

If you enjoyed these lists and want more context, make sure to follow him on Twitter and keep up with his blogs at Saastr.com.

Snippets

🏰 | Walt Disney Co’s surpassed Netflix in total paying subscribers to their streaming services (Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+).
🚗 | Ford’s CEO explained in an interview why Tesla’s EV strategy is so far ahead of the competition.
🧑‍⚖️ | Orca is suing competitor, Wiz, claiming that they’re copying everything from Orca’s tech to the coffee they serve at trade shows.
📈 | Mark Zuckerberg’s popularity is on the rise thanks to a classic competitive strategy—standing in opposition to something (in this case, Elon Musk).
📖 | Competitive strategy expert, Mayur Palta, released a new book. Outcompete shares seven strategic principles to help founders and leaders create lasting competitive advantages.
🥊 | Adam Neumann claims that his new startup, Flow, will either compete or partner with his former company, WeWork.
🎮 | Sony couldn’t block Microsoft’s purchase of Activision, but at least they can keep Call of Duty on the Playstation for another 10 years.

Quick Tip

Every company should have a “why us” or “why we’re different” page on their website like Bella + Canvas. And the video series as an added touch is *chef’s kiss*. Check it out here.

New Podcast: CI Lessons From Oracle, AWS, and Databricks

Mayur Palta has led Competitive Intel at some of the world's most valuable companies. And he just published a book with the lessons he learned along the way. In this episode we dive into:

what CEOs don't understand about Competitive Intel
memorable competitive campaigns between Oracle, AWS, and Salesforce
how to build your "compete" muscle with the Outcompete Operating System
the ethics of working for companies that are competing with your prior employer

And lots more.

Make sure you grab a copy of Mayur's book, Outcompete. All proceeds will go to Vibha, which empowers underprivileged children with the gift of education. So you can do some good AND learn about Competitive Intel 💚

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