Preemptive claim… Now where did I heard about that… I heard about preemptive strike, it’s where A strikes B on the basis that A fears that B is going to attack them (with or without proof). Or there is the preemptive measure in medical term where you are injected with a certain vaccine to be stronger or completely avoid a particular diseases. So what is preemptive claim in marketing means? Well, I couldn’t find one on my extensive selection of marketing books (actual figure: 3) back at home. However I heard my father mentioned about this term a lot, and well, it is quite true.

According to my father preemptive claim means that you claim something that is general in its sense but as an attribute to an existing product or brand. For example, in Indonesia there is mineral water company that claims its product is beneficial to health… Well, we all know that human body needs water to sustain its day to day function. So how come the water company claims like other brands/products is not beneficial to health then? Well, actually all mineral water is beneficial to health, regardless of what brand it is. But preemptively claiming something means that in all due respect, competing brand cannot use the same claim anymore. Because if they did use the claim, the company will be branded as a clear “me-too” which will benefit the claim originator.

Yamaha used the claim of “otomatis duluan” or in english: “The first matic scooter” on its Yamaha Mio marketing campaign. But what do you know, Yamaha isn’t the first company to sell an automatic scooter, but Kymco, a Korean marque was. However, Kymco used the slogan “automatic pioneer. So does preemptive claim in marketing is a moot point? Well, it depends. Claiming something that is general in its sense are a tricky thing. In the case of Yamaha and Kymco, both wanted to be recognized as the first at something related to automatic scooters. However both uses a different approach of the claim. Yamaha claims as the first automatic scooter, whereas Kymco claims as the pioneer. Is there something wrong there? Does Yamaha breach the claim as the first provider of automatic scooter? No.

One have to be highly observable in the marketing world. It is true that Kymco was the first pioneer of automatic scooter in Indonesia, but Yamaha also the first automatic scooter provider AMONG the Japanese motorbikes marque… AHA! There you go, a loophole that nobody knows. You see, being a marketer is like being a lawyer, in that you need to take advantage of the underlying small words and exploits it to no end.

Hey… Who said being a marketer won’t lead you to hell? At least wherever lawyers go when they die, they will see a lot of marketing people there too.

Edit: I’ve been asked by my readers for who is this father of mine which I based the logic of this article. Thankfully, my father is a double Doctorate degree holder in economics and communication and he wrote books about marketing communication principles (the other version). So at least I can attest by his input on the matter.