Strategic masochism

Boris Becker was a maddeningly frustrating tennis player. When he was good, he was breathtaking but when his bad was very, very bad. At his best he used a strategy only the very best would ever contemplate. He played to his enemies' strengths.

In most sport, most strategy for that matter, you tend to look for a weakness in your opponents' armoury and exploit it. Not Becker. Ivan Lendl had the most terrifying forehand in the game, Becker didn't play to the backhand, he let Lendl pound his trusty forehand at him, firing it back even harder. He wanted to show Lendl that his own forehand was better, ripping him apart by snatching away away the comfort of his best weapon. He usually cut him to ribbons.

He would play to Edberg's peerless backhand, beat the graceful Mecir with his own artistry and try stay back at the baseline against Agassi. It took incredible talent and strength of character to use a masochistic strategy like this, but then no one enjoyed bouncing off the ropes more than this German with his famous Wagnerian serve.

It's an interesting way to think of brand strategy too. We spend lots of time looking for gaps in the market, finding weaknesses in the competitive set to exploit. But what if sometime you were a little braver? What if you could find a way to make your opponents' core strengths into liabilities or pure irrelevance? Wouldn't that be fun? And more long term?

Comments

[Andrea]

This relates a bit to that post you had about male bickering - isn't it also about finding a weakness and exploiting it or just fighting more, harder? It's fair and fun if we talk about the latter, whereas the first might induce a revenge pattern - "You exploit my weakness and give a low blow, I'll do the same and you should bloody expect it soon."

It would be more long term, it would actually encourage healthy competition. And it'd be great if the client is in perfect zen sync with the agency. It takes a bit of complicity. :D

[Rob @ Cynic]

What a great, great point ... and a wonderful way to explain it.

I love this - infact I'm going to write something about it because in the right hands, arrogance can be a bloody great thing.

Brill post mate ...

[John]

It's not arrogance, it's self-confidence. If he were merley arrogant, he wouldn't have the ability to back it up. And it's a very smart strategy because once you neutralise the opponent's greatest strength you've completely undermined their self-confidence.

[Rob Mortimer]

It's old, but the Avis - We're number two so we try harder - cut right into the advantage of being number 1, and made the competition look complacent and static.

Good post mate.