Trojan Horse

A strategy of disguising your true objective inside something the target willingly accepts—gaining access through apparent gift or cooperation rather than through direct confrontation. In business: offering a free product to capture market share, then monetizing through adjacent services. Embedding a strategic initiative inside a routine project. Entering a market through partnership before competing directly. The Trojan Horse works because people evaluate what they see (the gift) without adequately considering what they don't see (the hidden payload). It exploits the gap between surface appearance and deeper strategic intent.

When to use it

When direct approaches to a market or objective face strong resistance; when evaluating competitors' or partners' suspiciously generous offers; when designing market entry strategies that need to bypass existing defenses; when analyzing why free products exist (what's the actual business model?).

How it can help

Both use and defend against Trojan Horse strategies. Offensively: when direct approaches face resistance, embed your strategic objective inside something the target values. Free tools that capture data, consulting engagements that create dependency, open-source projects that establish ecosystem dominance—all Trojan Horses. Defensively: when receiving unsolicited gifts, partnerships, or unusually generous offers, ask 'what's the hidden objective?' If someone is giving you something for free, you're probably not the customer—you're the product. Examine the business model behind every 'gift.'