Marketers often draw comparisons to the competitors of their products or services in marketing collateral and advertisements. This is a common tactic used to differentiate your company’s brand in the market place. Demonstrating your product’s unique characteristics through comparison is often a very effective tactic, but it must be used with caution.

Comparative marketing is best used when the competitor you are comparing against controls a large market share and has strong brand association. This strategy works well for new market entries and developing companies.

If your brand or company is well established you should use extreme caution when engaging in comparative marketing tactics. By comparing your product or service to that of a competitor you are vindicating the legitimacy of the brand you are comparing to.

By using comparison advertising you will be passing on validation that your competitor’s product is indeed a substitute for your offering, thereby communicating that the competitor is indeed a comparable competitor in the eyes of the consumer.

When you carefully use comparative advertising you are effectively calling out your competitor into to a battle of product vs. product.

If you are a smaller brand calling out a larger competitor in the market place it is often desirable to provoke your competitor to respond to your claims. When you call out a larger competitor and they respond to your advertisement or claim it adds validation to your message. In this scenario, your brand is able to derive some value through the interaction with a larger competitor who has more brand equity.

Because of this occurrence, established brands will often refrain from engaging in the competitive nature of the “Call Out”. These established brands have nothing to gain from participating in comparative marketing campaigns, since their brands are already perceived to be superior in the market place.

Occasionally the established brand will respond. When an emerging brand issues a challenge it can draw some attention to their offering but at the same time it opens them up to having their perceived “weaknesses” attacked by the party they are challenging.

Recently Audi has been attempting to maneuver themselves into the elite class of luxury cars currently held by BMW, Mercedes, and the newcomer, Lexus. But blunder after blunder and inconsistency on behalf of Audi’s brand marketers have stunted the company’s growth in the American market.

The latest attempt by Audi in a billboard advertisement featured in Santa Monica, California is a perfect example of how “calling out your competitors” can backfire on you.

In the advertising battle between BMW and Audi, Audi challenges BMW stating “Your move, BMW”. BMW casually and wittily responds to Audi’s ad with the snide remark “Checkmate.” In this clever advertisement BMW implies, “We are better than you and the market place already knows this, and that is why you are attempting to challenge us.” Touché!

Go see the ad on the corner of Santa Monica Blvd. and Beverly Glen Blvd in Los Angeles, CA.

Congratulations to BMW and Juggernaut Advertising for a quick and witty response to Audi’s challenge. This was a perfectly executed rebuttal from a well-established brand in the marketplace.

Tags: BMW V. Audi, Outdoor Advertising.