Working in small businesses, we know we’re heading for tough
times ahead. So, let’s ditch the
argument of whether we’re in a recession or not, and just get to what we’ll
need to know to recession proof our marketing.
1. Measurement is King:
More than ever, you’ll have to prove the worth of the budget you’ve fought for,
so make sure every dollar spent is accountable to a sale down the line. Search engine marketing is a great example of
marketing spending that is completely tied to revenue generated. See these best
practices for lead generation using search engine marketing.
2. You Can’t Beat Free:
You read blogs, so you know the value of content to readers. You won’t find a better time to start
blogging than a time when marketing costs are dwindling. See this guide on marketing
your business with a blog. Other low
cost or free options are word of mouth, press releases,
and additional low
cost marketing tips.
3. Lean on the Customers
and Prospects You Already Have: Take
the time to appreciate the customer list you’ve built. If you haven’t already done so, start an in-house
email newsletter to reach out to those customers and prospects from whom you’ve
already collected information. Here is
one set of tips for increasing
the value of email newsletters. This
is also a great time to build up your customer
testimonials, as people will be putting more consideration into their
purchases when money is tight.
Since budgets and customer spending are likely to be tight,
now may be the time to pull back from expensive outlays such as tradeshow
booths, spending which is not easily measured such as direct mail or TV ads,
and new fad expenditures such as social marketing which doesn’t have a proven
history of revenue generation.
Michelle Stern, Director of Client Services at iProspect, a search marketing agency, writes in DMNews about how to use search to measure the impact of offline media for geo-targeted campaigns. Since marketers can exclude geo-targeted areas from a national campaign in Google AdWords, they can now use search to isolate and test the performance of their offline initiatives in these "excluded" markets.
