When Somebody Compares You to a Competitor

The three versions

The price comparison. A review saying somebody else quoted less, sometimes from a customer who used you anyway and still mentions it.

The favourable comparison. A customer saying they went elsewhere first, it went badly, and you fixed it. Valuable and awkward.

The mistaken review. A complaint about work you did not do, posted on your listing because the customer confused two businesses.

Each needs a different response, and all three share one rule.

The rule

Do not discuss the competitor.

Not to agree, not to dispute, and not to explain why they are cheaper. Any comment about another business in a public review response reads badly regardless of how it is phrased, and it reflects on you rather than on them.

Readers are unusually alert to this. A business that criticises a competitor in a review response is read as insecure, and the criticism is discounted while the impression remains.

The workable approach is to answer the substance as though the competitor were not mentioned.

Answering the price comparison

The most common and the most useful to get right, because the readers are people making the same comparison.

What works: explaining what your price includes, factually and briefly, without reference to what anybody else's includes.

That converts a review about being expensive into a public explanation of your scope, read by exactly the audience weighing it. A three-sentence response setting out what the work covers is more persuasive than the original complaint.

What does not work: defending the price as fair, which is an assertion, or suggesting the cheaper quote must have omitted something, which is a claim about a competitor you cannot support.

Where the customer is right that you are more expensive, saying so plainly and explaining why is stronger than disputing it.

The favourable comparison

Genuinely useful and requiring restraint.

A customer describing a bad experience elsewhere and a good one with you has done something valuable. The temptation is to amplify it.

What to do instead: thank them, address your own part, and leave the other business entirely alone. A response that dwells on the competitor's failure looks like a business enjoying it.

There is also a practical caution. Encouraging or repeating disparaging claims about a named competitor carries legal risk if the claims are inaccurate, and amplifying somebody else's allegation is not a safe position.

The review does the work on its own. The response should be short.

The mistaken review

More common than expected, particularly where business names are similar.

The response: state politely that you have no record of the job, offer to check, and give a direct contact. That reads well to other readers without calling the reviewer a liar.

Then report it through the platform, which generally has a process for reviews about a different business. That is slow and worth pursuing.

Where this happens repeatedly because of name similarity, that is a naming and visibility problem rather than a review problem, and it is worth addressing at the source.

Reviews on a competitor's listing

The reverse situation, and it needs a clear position.

Do not post reviews of competitors, do not encourage customers to, and do not respond to conversations on their listings.

Posting a negative review of a competitor, or having somebody do it on your behalf, is a misleading practice and platforms treat it as a serious violation. It is also frequently traceable.

The same applies to positive reviews of your own business written by staff, family, or anybody with a connection you have not disclosed. Advertising rules require material connections to be disclosed, and a review presented as an independent customer's when it is not is exactly what those rules address.

What comparison reviews actually tell you

Worth reading as information rather than as an attack.

Repeated price comparisons mean either your positioning is not being communicated or you are genuinely out of step with the market. Both are worth knowing, and the second is worth checking rather than assuming.

Repeated favourable comparisons against the same competitor tell you where your customers come from and which weakness they are reacting to, which is useful for how you describe your own work.

Either way, the response is written for the next reader rather than for the reviewer, which is the same principle set out in the first bad review.

Frequently asked questions

West Coast Media Solutions Inc. provides web design, web development, hosting, digital marketing, and business consulting to organisations across Canada, drawing on more than twenty-five years in the field.