Bashing a competitor?

Never bash your competition. It makes you look unprofessional and desperate.

You can draw comparisons but focus on the positives rather than the negatives. When people have asked me about competitors in any business I have been in, I have always started by saying "Well, I am sure they have a very fine product. My product is a little different because...[insert positive + positive + positive]".

Unless someone asked me about the competition, I would always carry on with that customer as if I had none.

Professionals give the customer a choice. Yours should be the best choice. Never bad mouth any competitor or YOU will look bad. Also, one day you might want to team up with a competitor to reach a wider audience! Hope this helps

You already ARE bashing them. You should be focusing on providing an excellent service to your own customers and running a business.

What will happen if you start "bashing" your competitor?
How are you going to feel when they retaliate?
Are your pockets deep enough to pay your lawyer?

That is such a negative attitude to adopt before you've even started your business that I'm almost speechless.

If your services is, as you say, "helpful and needed" then customers should flock to you.

Bashing a competitor usually hurts more than it helps. It makes you look arrogant and insecure which people sense instantly, even over the Internet. I would probably list your pro's and advantage's that your competitor does not have but don't mention your competitor or use negative words. Be positive, people like that

I did not bash them...never mentioned them or my company so it's anyone's guess what company I am talking about. But yeah, I definitely see your guys point. Just wanted to get some opinions that's all

M42 touched on the keyword here:
Professionals

"Professionalism isn't a noun - its a verb"
- Craig William

It might be time to think about changing your name from 'EntrepreneurialSpirit' to something else when you start thinking about 'bashing'. Never bash a competitor, an unbiased comparison chart of facts that can be verified is a far better option e.g. price, guarantee period, refund policy etc. Also, include what extras you offer that are not mentioned on your competitors site.

I agree with what's been posted already - don't bash your competitors, but tell your customers how your product is different (and what it can do for them).

Comparison charts are good - that's no bashing them, just objectively pointing out the pros of your product.

That would be a huge and unprofessional mistake.Not talking about the fact that it would be immoral in my opinion. This is why we have a so called opened market and a thing called loyal competition. You are competing with other people who sale a similar product, and the customers will choose what fits them better. This is like opening a store next to another store, and starting to throw grenades in their window.

I'm sure potential customers know what's real and what's not. Bashing competition brings them free traffic. Just do what you need to, focus on yourself.

Bashing someone else never gets you anywhere. If I see someone is bashing someone else, it totally makes me uninterested in the one doing the bashing. Just go about your business and people will come to you.

Don't speak in the terms YOU do, but YEAH, you can bash them. DON'T use their name or really describe them.

A GOOD example is State farms bundling ad, where a guy keeps asking to make sure they don't send it off to "bundling bundlers", etc... They idea being that not all bundles are they same. SOME take disparate packages and put them together. If you keep doing business with them, the payment can go one place and all looks fine. Need help, and things get dicey. I am pretty sure I know who they are talking about, but they NEVER mention the name. It DOES destroy the competition's two main selling points(Price and a one stop shop concept), and give them a nice checkmark there though!

Steve

Bashing and insulting a specific competitor by name comes off as mean and rude, so you would never do that. Bashing what your competitors do, as a class, in comparison to what you do, I think is acceptable. That is, if you were to say, "many others in this industry use cheap plastic made in china for their widgets, but we don't because we know it doesn't last as long" type of statement.

Having said that, I can't get the Mac vs, Windows ads out of my head now. You know, where the cool young dude represents Mac and the overweight, nebbish looking older geezer who keeps making absurd excuses for why his stuff doesn't work represents Windows. Maybe you can bash the competitor by making fun of them. If you're Apple.

Anyway, if you're attracting customers because of a unique value proposition, right there that gives you something to speak about where it would be natural to highlight what you offer as better than the competition. In my field for example, I get a fair number of brides who are repulsed by mediocre uninspired photography. So we can talk about how she's found there's a lot of mediocre uninspired photography out there, and to be frank, it's the customers who end up bashing the competition that way. And who am I to disagree with their opinion?

OP I cant even begin to explain why you should never bash a competitor.

You are just going to hurt both you businesses. You should work with them, partnerships work way better than if you were to bash them

Fergal

If you want to conduct your business and personal life with positive energy then you will conduct yourself in a positive manner. Negativity will eventually and undoubtedly breed more negativity. You don't want that.