The lead article in last week’s BtoB – the magazine for marketing strategists – encouraged organizations to concentrate their spend on areas where there is a real ROI. Focused, frugal and relentless – not just with marketing, but in all operations – are the buzzwords being bandied about by various industry experts, who all have some words of wisdom to offer.
Whilst some degree of cost-cutting may be necessary to improve organizational efficiency, what will really differentiate between the companies that are merely good and those that are really great, will be how smart and how strategic their marketers are.
Segmentation of your customers has long been known to be a critical way of ensuring you are best serving your key customer groups, and one expert encourages the use of market research in creating value for your segments.
Don’t forget that your customers are also likely to be feeling the economic pinch. Help them by creating innovative products that will enable them to save money and be more efficient during a recession.
You must continue to market yourself, but do so by managing budgets effectively – be smart about spending money but do not disappear from view altogether.
By focusing on opportunities for growth now, companies will be in a much stronger position for recovery and growth when the economy starts to improve.
The positive result of intelligent marketing in tricky times is, of course, that organizations will emerge on the other side much leaner, much more relevant and much more customer-savvy.
To read the BtoB article in full, click here.
