switching-cost-evaluation

name	switching-cost-evaluation
description	Analyze the real cost of switching between products — financial, technical, operational, political, and emotional. Use when trying to win customers from competitors, worried about churn to alternatives, designing migration tools, or setting pricing relative to switching friction.

Switching Cost Evaluation

Understand the real cost of switching — it's never just money.

How to use

• /switching-cost-evaluation Apply switching cost constraints to this conversation.
• /switching-cost-evaluation <from> <to> Evaluate switching costs between two specific products.

Constraints

Five Types of Switching Costs

MUST assess all five. Most teams only think about the first.

1. Financial: remaining contracts, migration costs, duplicate subscriptions during transition
2. Technical: data migration, integration rewiring, custom config loss, API changes, learning curve
3. Operational: team retraining, process changes, productivity dip, documentation updates
4. Political: who championed the current tool, executive approval needed, blame risk if switch fails
5. Emotional: familiarity, identity ("we're a Slack company"), fear of the unknown, vendor relationships

Scoring

• Rate each type 1-5 (1 = negligible, 5 = could prevent the switch)
• Total score out of 25
• 5-10: low. Compete on product merit. Easy to win, easy to lose.
• 11-17: moderate. Need clear ROI story and migration support.
• 18-25: high. Need a compelling event (contract renewal, failure, leadership change) to create an opening.

Offensive Strategy (Winning Switchers)

• SHOULD offer free migration tools or import-from-competitor features
• SHOULD time outreach around contract renewals and competitor price increases
• MUST build a clear ROI case: (new product value - current value) > total switching cost
• NEVER assume product quality alone overcomes high switching costs

Defensive Strategy (Keeping Customers)

• SHOULD increase healthy switching costs through deep workflow integration, historical data, and team expertise
• NEVER increase switching costs through toxic lock-in (hard-to-export data, hidden cancellation, contract handcuffs)
• Goal: be hard to leave because you're valuable, not because you've trapped them

Anti-Patterns

• Only evaluating financial costs and ignoring the other four
• Assuming switching cost is zero because your product is better
• Using lock-in tactics that breed resentment and eventually backfire
• Ignoring political dynamics — the person who championed the old tool has veto power