All of us are feeling the pinch in our business and personal during the trough of the recession, food costs are up employment is down and it seems businesses are neglecting their long term interests such as marketing and branding exercises.
The IPA report on 'Advertising in a downturn' clearly states that businesses are cutting marketing costs in favour of short term savings. This could prove to be a substantial error. Competition in 2009 is stronger than ever and saving money makes sense, but not reminding people how important your brand is to their working or personal life could reduce their contribution. Conversely a competitor might take the opportunity to engage with your existing or potential customers.
It is important that you maintain your bread and butter marketing and take the opportunity to trial other marketing techniques, who knows maybe you could be taking a slice of pie from another competitor.
Something I have worked with and would recommend is mobile marketing and SMS advertising. The Text Works are renowned for their customer service, marketing advice and live demonstrations even before you are a customer. SMS is a great way of reaching people. The open rate is higher, its cheaper than other more traditional marketing and you can build surprisingly accurate demographics for targeted promotions or even promote third party products for a tidy profit. Take a look at their marketing case studies for more information.
Other methods can be used to drive brand attention foe example social media can be great for branding and promotions. I look forward to your comments and questions and wish all of you the best of luck in these trying times.
No comments:
Post a Comment