Brand-To-Brand Praise: Complimenting Competitors Can Help Companies Boost Reputation, Sales, Study Shows

There's a "valuable, albeit unexpected" way for brands to boost their connection with their customers – they just need to focus on their competitors, says a new study.

It might sound counter-intuitive, but it would actually do the brands some good when they compliment their competitors, the researchers of a new study, published in the Journal of Marketing, have found.

The research team conducted experiments in the field, laboratory and online on "brand-to-brand praise." In one of the experiments, for instance, they looked at how two different tweets would affect consumers, Duke University noted in a news release.

In one tweet, the participants were shown a fake tweet from Kit Kat congratulating Twix for completing "54 years in the business."

"Even we can admit — Twix are delicious," the fake tweet read, while a control group saw a tweet from Kit Kat that was simply about its own product.

The researchers found that those who saw the fake tweet were 34% more likely to buy a Kit Kat compared to the control group. Furthermore, this did not increase Twix sales even though it was praised by the competitor, Duke University noted.

This is because brand-to-brand praise increases the "perceptions of brand warmth," the researchers noted.

"You don't want to spend your media dollars talking about the competition, but there are times when it makes sense to say something nice, and at the same time, signal who you are as a brand," study co-author Keisha Cutright, of Duke University's Fuqua School of Business, said in the news release. "That message is that they're a warm, caring brand that you can trust, which implies they're also going to be considerate and warm to their customers."

In fact, the positive effects were more "significant" for organizations that were not exactly seen as "warm and fuzzy," Duke University noted, adding that the experiments showed the "most skeptical consumers" were even likely to have "the biggest positive response" to the companies that complimented their competitors.

"Consumers have grown increasingly skeptical of brands, leaving managers in a dire search for novel ways to connect," the researchers wrote. "The authors suggest that focusing on one's relationships with competitors is a valuable, albeit unexpected, way for brands to do so."

The "key" is authenticity as "constantly" praising one's competitor may appear insincere to consumers, Cutright noted.