Guide Competitor crisis · Crisis · 6 min read

A competitor recalls a product, its online shop has been down for days, or its management is in the headlines. In the marketing chat, someone suggests a cheeky post. Here you will read how competitor monitoring shows such crises early, why in most cases you are better off not commenting on them and where competition law in Germany and Austria draws lines. Our verdict up front: a competitor crisis is a chance to learn and a poor stage for advertising. It also helps you prepare for your own emergency: what goes wrong at a competitor, you see more clearly from the outside than in your own company, without being under pressure yourself. Information as of 16 October 2026, not legal advice.

What does a competitor crisis mean for you?

A competitor crisis changes the market in the short term, and you need to be able to react to that. The Gabler Wirtschaftslexikon names, among other things, the purpose of competitor analysis as making short-term decisions easier by observing shifts in the competitive situation. A crisis is exactly such a shift.

You should keep an eye on three consequences:

• Customers switch: IHK München describes how customers who learn about supply problems look around for other suppliers. Their enquiries then land with you.
• Similar products come under suspicion: IHK Bodensee-Oberschwaben recommends including publications in the EU rapid alert system Safety Gate in your own product monitoring. A recall at a competitor can point to a risk in your range.
• Temptation to gloat: a quick dig gets attention, but it can have legal and communication consequences.

Gabler names another purpose of competitor analysis: identifying opportunities for cooperation with competitors. This can also become relevant in a crisis, for example when a whole industry is under suspicion and joint clarification achieves more than setting yourself apart.

How do you monitor crises at competitors?

You monitor crises at competitors with competitor monitoring in your monitoring tool: separate searches for the names of competitors, their products and their management, plus alerts for spikes. In issues management, the Gabler Wirtschaftslexikon describes two stages: scanning as still unspecific observation of the environment and monitoring as targeted, continuous observation of what is considered relevant.

In practice, this means:

1. Set up competitor tracking: create a search for each important competitor that also captures terms such as “recall”, “outage” or “scandal”.
2. Compare: many tools show mentions, sentiment and reach for several brands side by side. A spike at a competitor then stands out immediately.
3. Compare profiles: social media analytics tools show how interactions develop on competitors’ profiles.
4. Add official sources: Safety Gate for product warnings in your category.

Forward alerts about competitors to marketing, sales and product management, as well as to the social media team. If you first hear about a competitor’s recall from a customer enquiry, your monitoring has a gap. Check your searches regularly, because product names change.

When analysing results, pay attention to sentiment. How tools measure it and where they get it wrong is explained in the guide to sentiment analysis. The basics of search queries are in the guide to social listening.

Should you comment on a competitor crisis?

As a rule, you do not comment publicly on a competitor crisis. Advertising that jumps on a current news story is often called newsjacking; in the case of a competitor’s crisis it quickly comes across as gloating, and it can breach competition law.

The German Communication Code of the German Council for Public Relations (DRPR) sets the direction. Under the heading of fairness it says that PR and communication professionals convince “through arguments as well as fair and respectful communication behaviour”. Under truthfulness it states that spreading rumours further without checking them is not tolerable.

The case is different when customers ask you directly. Then you answer factually about your own offering: what you deliver, from when, on what terms. You say nothing about the competitor that you cannot prove. Industry issues are a special case: if a crisis affects the whole category, factual information about your own products can make sense, without naming the competitor.

Brief your team as well. In its Standard 200-4, the BSI names rules on what employees may say on social media as a fixed part of crisis preparation. A well-meant joke from a sales rep’s profile reflects back on your company.

Where does competition law draw lines?

In Germany and Austria, competition law prohibits disparaging competitors or spreading unproven, business-damaging facts about them. The most important provisions in their wording:

Provision	Content according to the law
§ 4 Nr. 1 UWG (DE)	anyone who disparages or denigrates the marks, goods, services, activities or circumstances of a competitor acts unfairly
§ 4 Nr. 2 UWG (DE)	anyone who asserts or spreads facts about the goods, services or business of a competitor that are capable of damaging the operation of the business or its credit acts unfairly, unless the facts are demonstrably true
§ 6 UWG (DE)	comparative advertising is unfair if, among other things, it disparages or denigrates a competitor
§ 7 UWG (AT) Herabsetzung eines Unternehmens	anyone who, for purposes of competition, spreads business-damaging facts that are not demonstrably true is liable for damages; the injured party can demand that the conduct stop and that the statement be retracted
§ 2a UWG (AT)	comparative advertising is permitted if, among other things, it does not violate § 7

For a post about a competitor’s crisis, this means: even a pointed allusion can be disparagement, and you must be able to prove every statement of fact. Also think of comments under other people’s posts and of ads that appear in searches about the crisis. Whether a specific wording is permissible is something you clarify beforehand with a lawyer specialising in competition law.

How do you use the situation without causing harm?

You use the situation by doing your own homework and being ready for customers who switch. A competitor crisis is a free stress test for your own crisis plan.

• Check your own risks: could the same problem occur at your company? For products, check components and suppliers; for outages, check your emergency processes.
• Test your crisis plan: run through the competitor’s case with your team.
• Prepare your service: response templates for enquiries from customers who want to switch, with facts on delivery times and terms.
• Review campaigns: is there advertising running right now that could look like an allusion? Then postpone it.
• Inform partners: retailers and sales partners are often the first to ask whether your product is affected too. Give them a short answer backed by evidence.
• Document lessons: record which signals announced the crisis in advance, and add to your search terms.

What to do in your own crisis is described in the guide to crisis communication; for recalls, the guide to product crises helps.

Which tools help with competitor monitoring?

Monitoring tools with brand comparison and analytics tools with competitor profiles help here. Provider information (as of October 2026):

Tool	Function according to the provider	Price according to the provider
Awario	Competitive brand monitoring comparing alerts, sentiment and reach, real-time notifications	from €29 per month, paid annually
Brand24	Project comparison and share of voice, storm alerts	from $199 per month, paid annually
Fanpage Karma	unlimited competitor profiles, backlash alerts	benchmarking add-on €19 per brand
Metricool	competitor analysis for 5 to 100 profiles	free plan with 5 competitors

Compare more tools under social media monitoring tools and social media analytics tools.

Our advice: for competitor monitoring, an inexpensive monitoring tool with brand comparison is often enough. What matters more than features is that someone reads the results regularly and passes anomalies to the right people. How we rate tools is explained in our methodology.