26 WESTERN PALLET
imarketing during a recession can gain market share and improve the returns at a lower cost. How? When your competition cuts its spending, media companies, trade shows, and agencies feel the pinch like everyone else. It’s often possible to negotiate discounts or lock in lower rates in exchange for a longer commitment, simply because so few of your competitors are willing to do so. And because your competitors have gone quiet, you can capture additional share of voice simply by maintaining your current spend.
…but if you must cut your marketing budget, be surgical and strategic
If you absolutely must cut marketing spending, try to maintain the frequency of your communications to maintain awareness of your company and products.
Do this by adjusting your marketing mix to emphasize low-cost, direct channels like email, and social media, which have
more immediate sales impact than advertising.
Surgically trimming the budget is easier to do during a downturn than in prosperous times. Take advantage of this opportunity to objectively evaluate the performance of each of your marketing tactics and cut loose poor performers, even those “sacred cows”. It’s much easier to get buy-in for eliminating pet projects and vanity spend during times of economic pressure, and your program will emerge from the recession much better for it.
When faced with an economic downturn, smart B2B firms don’t reduce their marketing presence, they use the situation to their advantage. The goal is to make data-driven, case-by-case recommendations about where to cut the budget, where to maintain, and where to increase it. By avoiding the biggest mistake, slashing your budget, you can emerge from a recession stronger and more profitable than before.
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