Attacking the Competition - Good or Bad For Business?
T-Mobile is taking a page out of Apple's marketing handbook with their latest ad campaign.
In case you haven't seen it yet, T-Mobile has come out swinging at AT&T in an ad designed similar to the successful Mac vs.
PC campaign.
Just when you thought you had the latest and greatest 3G phone, T-Mobile shows up like that annoying friend who always has to have something better than you.
You see, the latest phone on their network has 4G capabilities and they're making sure you know their competitor AT&T is living in the dark ages with their 3G network.
According to the ad, the increased speed means you can make video calls from anywhere.
Currently, making a video call on an AT&T serviced device requires a WiFi connection.
It would make sense to assume that browsing and downloading would be faster over 4G as well.
When one company directly attacks their own competition it's always going to rub some people the wrong way.
It's not a new tactic though and it's often very successful.
Here's what I think are the major positives of taking this approach: People are talking.
When was the last time you heard someone talking about T-Mobile and their 4G network? I guarantee that you'll be seeing a lot more discussion about them now.
This morning my Google Reader was full of posts about this new campaign.
The video was just posted yesterday and it's already making an impact.
Puts competition on alert.
With this kind of campaign you're sending a direct message to your competition (and shareholders) that you want some of their market share.
AT&T is going to pay close attention to T-Mobile now and be forced to come up with a strategy if the ads have their desired effect.
Highlights major selling point.
When you're attacking the competition you're always going to do it by bragging about what you do better than them.
Why would I choose T-Mobile over AT&T? Well I didn't know the differences between the two before but now I do thanks to these ads.
These kinds of ads make good business sense but there's one major negative: dividing the customer market.
As a Mac owner, I've never faced so much hostility from PC owners over my choice of computer than after the Mac vs.
PC ads started airing.
Why? Because it ticked them off.
T-Mobile's campaign is going to end up ticking off AT&T subscribers, which could escalate to flame wars on blogs, Facebook, Twitter and so on.
It's never a good thing when companies arouse hostility out of customers in their own market.
It will be interesting to track how this campaign affects business.
There's no doubt they'll see a sales spike but will they be able to sustain it? I'm also interested in the public perception of T-Mobile after more people start seeing this ad.
Let me know what you think in the comments! Was this a good move by T-Mobile or do you think it will do them more harm than anything?
In case you haven't seen it yet, T-Mobile has come out swinging at AT&T in an ad designed similar to the successful Mac vs.
PC campaign.
Just when you thought you had the latest and greatest 3G phone, T-Mobile shows up like that annoying friend who always has to have something better than you.
You see, the latest phone on their network has 4G capabilities and they're making sure you know their competitor AT&T is living in the dark ages with their 3G network.
According to the ad, the increased speed means you can make video calls from anywhere.
Currently, making a video call on an AT&T serviced device requires a WiFi connection.
It would make sense to assume that browsing and downloading would be faster over 4G as well.
When one company directly attacks their own competition it's always going to rub some people the wrong way.
It's not a new tactic though and it's often very successful.
Here's what I think are the major positives of taking this approach: People are talking.
When was the last time you heard someone talking about T-Mobile and their 4G network? I guarantee that you'll be seeing a lot more discussion about them now.
This morning my Google Reader was full of posts about this new campaign.
The video was just posted yesterday and it's already making an impact.
Puts competition on alert.
With this kind of campaign you're sending a direct message to your competition (and shareholders) that you want some of their market share.
AT&T is going to pay close attention to T-Mobile now and be forced to come up with a strategy if the ads have their desired effect.
Highlights major selling point.
When you're attacking the competition you're always going to do it by bragging about what you do better than them.
Why would I choose T-Mobile over AT&T? Well I didn't know the differences between the two before but now I do thanks to these ads.
These kinds of ads make good business sense but there's one major negative: dividing the customer market.
As a Mac owner, I've never faced so much hostility from PC owners over my choice of computer than after the Mac vs.
PC ads started airing.
Why? Because it ticked them off.
T-Mobile's campaign is going to end up ticking off AT&T subscribers, which could escalate to flame wars on blogs, Facebook, Twitter and so on.
It's never a good thing when companies arouse hostility out of customers in their own market.
It will be interesting to track how this campaign affects business.
There's no doubt they'll see a sales spike but will they be able to sustain it? I'm also interested in the public perception of T-Mobile after more people start seeing this ad.
Let me know what you think in the comments! Was this a good move by T-Mobile or do you think it will do them more harm than anything?
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