How do you get advertising cut through if you’re being outspent? How do you get cut-through when a competitor outspends you in advertising? Clive Palmer’s UAP is set to spend $80 million on TV, print, radio, outdoor and digital advertising this election – seven times more than political rivals. If it’s a repeat of the 2019 election, it will “drown out” advertising from both major parties and maybe provide an indirect benefit to the Liberal Party. However, will it lead to UAP picking up any seats or prevent a major party from gaining office? Depending on UAP’s objective, the challenge is that they have low market share and low brand loyalty. In marketing, we call this the law of double jeopardy – brands with lower markets shares suffer both from low purchases and low brand loyalty. That means UAP has to spend much more on advertising compared to larger parties in order to get the attention of voters and convert a very small number of them. Businesses face the same challenge. To build a strong “sticky” brand, you need to invest in marketing communications that attract and retain the best-fit customers. If you already have a strong brand with a dominant market share, it is much easier to do this because of the double jeopardy effect, providing you have the right mix of content, media and channels.  But if you have low market share and low brand loyalty, it’s much more difficult to draw customers away from larger competitors unless you have something compelling to offer. Even if you do, the challenge will be to reach them without being “drowned out.”  Often, a better strategy is to target customers of smaller competitors who are a good fit. Then as you grow market share and develop a stronger brand, customers become your most powerful form of advertising. #marketing #advertising #doublejeopardy