The Market Seems to Be Improving… What Now?

After a long “hangover” the selling market for goods and services does look like it is finally bouncing back. What you do with your marketing and advertising depends much on what you did during the market’s decline. Did you cut back or did you “cut out”?

If you cut back, a gradual increase in allocations will allow you to track incremental increases in customer responses and continue to monitor the results of those increases. If you “cut out” your advertising (especially if it was for a long period), your task is more complicated and likely more expensive.

The cut back did not completely remove you from the share of voice that your competitors share with you. In fact, if they cut back more than you, it may have even increased. Gradually rebuilding those message deliveries will, eventually, rebuild themselves and your share of market will soon follow. As the market gets better and better, volume sales levels will follow. How quickly will be determined by the overall market’s growth and health.

If you ” cut out” your marketing and advertising, think about a more aggressive rather than gradual re-entry. Spend a little more than you were when you stopped, then gradually return to the spending levels where you are currently projecting. This strategy will increase your short term share of voice dramatically and reposition your brand in the minds of your former and existing customers. The early increases in your budgeting will cost more for a period of time, but not as much as your decision to cut out advertising originally. The business that you missed out on can never be replaced.

I warned you in my posting: “Fire Your Best Salesman.”

This entry was posted on Monday, October 12th, 2009 at 10:25 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.