They went straight to paying massive wages for ok players. Chelsea for instance had Duff before they got Robben etc. And that's not really applicable as they were a decent side in the late 90's and had CL football. We have to go through that same pain, we did it last year and moved a step up and will do it again this year now we have European football. But it will be a slow process as the 6 teams above us are not going to just stop financially to let us catch up. This is the main difference between us and what happened at Chelsea and City, they had less teams to compete against to get to that level.
What we need is Spurs to go off the boil playing at Wembley, Arsenal to meltdown under fan pressure, plus a possibility of Wenger leaving part way through the season. (if he is there at all) If we can then compete with the RS for that 4th spot and we can get it or be within touching distance that might just kick us on with the process of getting to that elite level. If everything runs to par we probably finish 7th again, maybe a bit closer points wise, but it will just be incremental improvements for the season afterwards and by that point Spurs will be in their new home and Arsenal may have recruited a top manager.