“Brace yourselves: We’re heading for a recession…” says one paper. “We’ve never had it so good,” says another.
While pundits argue (and confuse us) about whether there is an official ‘recession’ on the horizon or not what matters to those of us who are self-employed is how are we supposed to survive the very real credit crunch ‘fallout’.
Some solopreneurs and SMEs are cutting costs where they can. Unfortunately, this happens to be in the very area where no one interested in staying in business can ill afford to ‘downsize’: marketing.
Experts agree that now is NOT the time to wind down your marketing spend. On the contrary, you’d be wise to up the spend. For investment in marketing now will help shield against any future revenue losses.
As the study Turning Adversity into Advantage: Does Proactive Marketing During a Recession Pay Off?, shows organisations that a) value marketing, b) feature a corporate culture that rewards risk-taking, and c) are willing to up the ante on marketing efforts are those who come out on top.
“The firms that had all three characteristics did very well in a recession. But firms that are missing any one of them, they’re in trouble,” says As Dr Gary Lilien, one of the report’s authors.
It’s true that when times are tough competitors often fall by the wayside. Any steps you can take to enhance your efforts to find new customers/clients, and to turn existing ones into loyal long-term buyers of your goods/services will help you come of any recession [whether real or imagined] really, really well.
So do yourself a favour: Be bold and rejuvenate your marketing. You’ll thank yourself in the long run regardless of whether or not we slide into a full-scale recession.