Gazelle, Lion, Hyena, Vulture, and Worm: A Teaching Metaphor on Competition Between Early and Late Market Entrants

Abstract

Many marketing educators and students have come to understand business competition through metaphors of marketing as war. Such metaphors are useful, but like any metaphor, their effectiveness is inherently contingent upon students' familiarity with the underlying contexts (e.g., warfare or military situations). Hence, such metaphors may fall short in helping students understand competition and the players involved in it. In this paper, I present a simple teaching approach based on a five-creature metaphor—gazelle, lion, hyena, vulture, and worm. This approach can serve as an adjunct or alternative to the conventional perspective of marketing as war. Here, I provide qualitative data revealing student preconceptions about my approach and quantitative data reflecting their evaluations of its educational enjoyment and utility. The findings suggest that marketing students understand the semantic context of my metaphor, recognize its applications, and perceive its lessons as being relevant to their other business courses.