Credit Card Company Competition Heating Up

In our last blog, we pointed out the fact that, of all the credit card companies, Discover was the only one to broadcast a commercial during the Super Bowl. The annual Super Bowl broadcast, in case you weren’t aware, is considered the most advantageous television airing of the year for advertisers. It’s well known that a 30-second slot during the big game has been known to command millions of dollars.

In fact, Noreen O’Leary of AdWeek.com reports that, this year, a 30-second slot during the Super Bowl cost upwards of $4.5 million! Is such an enormous cost worth it? It would appear as if Discover’s competitors, Visa, MasterCard and American Express think not. O’Leary notes that it’s been quite a long time since any of these credit card companies have run commercials during the Super Bowl.

“If the Super Bowl was an obvious choice for Discover, TV\’s biggest event has fallen out of favour with the brand\’s competitors in recent years,” writes O’Leary, “One industry observer speculated that category marketers now tend to be more targeted in their overall strategies and not interested in paying the high premium for the Big Game\’s huge viewership.” She goes on to reveal the last time any of the other companies ran Super Bowl ads.

It has been ten years for Visa, she says. In 2005, the credit card giant ran a “Super Heroes” spot. “A group of caped heroes come to the rescue of a woman in distress only to realize she doesn\’t have a problem after her Visa Check Card is stolen because she\’s not liable for fraudulent purchases,” explains O’Leary of the decade-old commercial. That year, Visa had MasterCard as a Super Bowl ad-running rival.

In their “Icons” spot, “the marketer shows a dinner party attended by the CPG world\’s most famous spokes-characters like Charlie Tuna, Count Chocula, Chef Boyardee, Pillsbury Doughboy and the Green Giant, among others,” O’Leary explains. And while these ads seem like interesting ones, it makes one wonder whether or not Visa and MasterCard even need to advertise during the Super Bowl. Aren’t they the most popular credit cards already?

If so, Discover has certainly taken advantage of a great opportunity. Without any competition this year, their new ad is bound to garner some added attention for their brand. “Within the credit and debit card category, Discover is the only marketer making an appearance in the Big Game this year, and the brand\’s senior VP of brand and acquisition, Julie Loeger, said it was a no-brainer,” O’Leary reports.

“It was a really easy decision,” Loeger is quoted as saying, “We have big news for consumers and the Super Bowl is a fabulous platform through which to tell it to them.” So what does this mean for your business? It’s evident that the competition between credit card companies is heating up. Are you accepting these credit cards in your store? If not, now is definitely the time to get more competitive in your market.

At Canadian POS Corporation, we offer our clients top-of-the-line POS terminals that allow them to accept all credit cards: Visa, MasterCard, American Express and Discover. Our machines also accept Interac debit cards. That means that you’ll no longer have to turn away the many Canadian customers who would prefer to use plastic to pay for their purchases. Get set up today by calling us at 1-877-748-2884!