N-Ergie, the no. 8 in the German electric power business successfully defended its client basis with an advertising budget of only 3,6 million € in 5 years (700.000 € per year) against attackers such as Yello (with a budget of more than 130 million €) or E.ON (with a budget of 294 million € in the same time period).

The recipe for success was that N-Ergie managed to dominate the core benefit of emotional and regional „nearness“, whilst Yello and E.ON focussed in their communication on the creative idea of giving electrical power a colour and less relevant benefits (such as absolute price).

Methods used: Projective Techniques, b2b-Explorations, Advertising Effect Pre-Test, Invoice Effect Test

H. Dörr (N-Ergie), R. Mayer de Groot: N-Ergie: Erfolg mit niedrigem Budget im schwierigen Ener-giemarkt, (Success with low budget in the difficult electric power market) 2007