Articles

The Sky is Falling—Run and Hide?

By Keith Thirgood and Helen Walter

Ever since the financial sector crisis in America began, there’s been a cloud of pessimism and fear reaching over the land. Here in Canada, I listen to business people talk about recession. Businesses big and small are cutting back on expenses, laying-off staff. The talk is even gloomier in the States. Many younger business people seem completely thrown off balance, while those of us a little older, look to be hunkering down to wait out the coming storm.

What a great opportunity.

Sure, many of your customers are going to reduce or stop spending on what you sell. But for most of you, there’ll still be customers buying.

“So what”, you say. “The pie’s getting smaller, my business is going to suffer. I’ve got to cut back!!”

Not so, brave reader. That’s exactly what your competition is thinking right now. After all, “logical” thinking runs like this. Reduced sales, equals reduced income; therefore, you must reduce your expenditures to meet the challenge. And where do most businesses reduce their expenditures first? They cut their marketing budget and layoff support and customer service staff.

If you spend less time marketing and advertising, and your customers find it harder to get service. What do you think the results of that will be?

Right. Sales will fall even faster, which calls for more cuts. And on, and on, and on.

What’s the cure? Glad you asked.

While your competition’s trying to protect its backside by burying its head in the sand, you get more aggressive.

I don’t mean you need to change the tone of your marketing. You don’t have to come at it all snapping and snarling. What I mean is get more marketing tools out there working for you than you normally would. Advertise more, run bigger ads. Send more brochures. Make more calls. Deliver more seminars. Write more articles. Get out to more networking events.

Because there’s less to be seen from your competition, your modest increase in marketing exposure will look like a huge increase. Your prospects will notice you more, because there’s less clutter. For a small increase in effort and expenditure, you can have a one hundred or two hundred percent or even bigger impact.

Marketing during a downturn isn’t an extravagance. It’s your big chance to make a huge jump on your competition. While they’re busy trying to save their way through the recession, you’ll be stealing their lunch.

And this isn’t wishful thinking. Although there are fewer potential clients, people are still buying. They still need to decide with whom they will trust their cash.

Your job is to get in front of them—like you’ve never done before—and become their new best supplier.

Keith is Creative Director and Helen is Senior Designer of Capstone Communications Group, a marketing and design firm with years of experience in marketing small and mid-size businesses. They can be reached at (905) 472-2330, or by visiting their website http://www.capstonecomm.com.