As a founder, CEO, or leader, your job is to build a business that not only survives but thrives. Yet, many of us unknowingly find ourselves trapped in a red ocean—a crowded, bloody battlefield where competitors fight over the same customers with marginally better products, services, or prices.
What if, instead of fighting to be better, you could create a new space where you’re not competing at all? That’s the promise of category design: creating a market where your brand leads, defines, and dominates.
At Boken, we’ve seen it time and time again—brands exhausting themselves in incremental battles, missing the chance to create something transformational. The first step to breaking free? Asking the right questions. Here are 10 essential questions every founder, CEO, and leader should ask to uncover whether they’re stuck in a “better” fight or ready to own a category.
1. Is your brand focused on being better or different?
Most brands fall into the trap of incremental improvements. You might have a slightly faster product, a cheaper price, or a more attractive design. But are you truly different, or are you just trying to outdo your competitors on their terms?
Category leaders don’t just improve; they redefine the problem they solve and how it’s solved. Think about how Uber didn’t just build a better taxi service—it created a category around ridesharing.
Action: Write down your brand’s primary value proposition. Does it focus on being “better” than competitors, or does it fundamentally change the game?
2. Are you defining the problem, or letting your competitors define it?
Category creators own the narrative by framing the problem in a way that aligns with their solution. If you’re playing by someone else’s rules, you’re already behind.
Consider Peloton. They didn’t sell stationary bikes—they sold a new way to bring immersive fitness classes into the home, making gyms feel outdated for their audience.
Action: Ask yourself: Have we defined the problem in a way that makes our solution the obvious choice?
3. Are you chasing market share or creating market demand?
In a red ocean, companies fight for slices of an existing pie. In a blue ocean—or a new category—you’re baking an entirely new pie, creating demand where it didn’t exist before.
Take Tesla. They didn’t just compete with other car manufacturers—they created demand for electric vehicles as a category of aspiration and innovation.
Action: Evaluate your efforts: Are you competing for existing buyers, or are you pulling in customers who never considered a solution like yours before?
4. Are you spending more time reacting than innovating?
If your strategy is shaped by what competitors are doing, you’re trapped in a red ocean. True category designers lead the market—they don’t follow.
Apple rarely reacts to competitors’ innovations. Instead, they set the tone, whether it’s through launching the iPhone or redefining wearable technology with the Apple Watch.
Action: Review your strategic decisions over the last 12 months. How many were proactive versus reactive?
5. Are you solving a big enough problem?
Category creation starts with solving a problem that matters—one people care enough about to adopt a new way of thinking, working, or living.
Slack didn’t just offer a better team messaging app; they reframed workplace communication as broken and positioned Slack as the antidote to email chaos.
Action: Challenge yourself: Is the problem you’re solving big enough to matter, and are you making it feel urgent?
6. Do your customers see your brand as essential or optional?
In a crowded market, customers have options. But in a category you own, your brand becomes the default choice—the category king.
Think about Zoom during the pandemic. They weren’t just one video conferencing tool among many—they became synonymous with the category itself because they owned the narrative and captured the demand at the right time.
Action: Ask your customers or team: “If our brand disappeared tomorrow, what would they replace us with?”
7. Are you creating a movement or selling a product?
Category leaders don’t just sell products or services—they create movements. They align with values, challenge norms, and build communities around their vision.
Patagonia is a prime example. They don’t just sell outdoor gear; they lead a movement for environmental activism, making their brand about something much bigger than jackets and backpacks.
Action: Consider: What larger mission or belief does your brand stand for? Are you rallying your audience around it?
8. Are you investing in brand narrative as much as product development?
The best category designers know that it’s not just about what you sell—it’s about the story you tell. A compelling narrative can elevate a good product into a category leader.
Airbnb didn’t just build a platform for booking homes; they told a story about “belonging anywhere,” reframing how people viewed travel and accommodations.
Action: Review your marketing and branding efforts. Is your narrative as strong as your product?
9. Do you have a clear vision of what winning looks like in your category?
Winning in a category isn’t about having the most features or the lowest price—it’s about becoming the brand that defines the category itself.
Think of Kleenex, Google, or Zoom—brands that are synonymous with their categories. They didn’t just participate in the market; they became the market.
Action: Define what winning looks like for your brand. Is it market share, cultural relevance, or being the go-to name in your category?
10. Are you ready to commit to category creation, even if it’s harder at first?
Category design isn’t for the faint of heart. It takes time, vision, and relentless execution. But the rewards—becoming the undisputed leader in your market—are worth it.
Look at Salesforce. They didn’t just sell software—they pioneered the SaaS model and defined CRM in the cloud. It wasn’t easy, but their long-term commitment paid off in becoming the category king.
Action: Ask yourself and your leadership team: Are we willing to put in the effort to create something transformational, even if it means slower progress in the short term?
Ready for change?
The questions above aren’t just strategic exercises—they’re invitations to think bigger about your business. If you’re fighting to be “better” in a red ocean, you’ll constantly struggle against competitors who are just as determined to outdo you.
But if you embrace category design, you shift the game entirely. You create a space where your brand defines the rules, leads the conversation, and captures the lion’s share of the value.
At Boken, we specialize in helping founders, CEOs, and leaders like you break free from the red ocean and build brands that own their categories. It’s not easy, but it’s the kind of work that changes the game for your business—and for the customers you serve.
So, which will it be? The incremental fight to be better—or the bold move to own the market? The choice is yours.
– Chris Loope
CEO and Founder, Boken
