Small business marketing in a recession

According to the 'experts' we're not in the grips of a recession just yet. However, many of my customers own small businesses and the feedback I'm getting from them is fairly consistent... everyone is feeling the pinch.

At times like this, people are naturally inclined to reduce their business overheads and typically one of the first casualties is the marketing/advertising budget. However, successful marketing is all about quality not quantity so for the clever marketeer there are loads of opportunities to increase sales whilst keeping a very close eye on the purse strings.

A few tactics you might want to try:

• Stop trying to advertise your business to everyone and anyone. 'Preaching to the masses' is a luxury you really can't afford... even when times are good! Instead, identify your target audience and devise ways of speaking directly and only to them. This approach will often lower your advertising and printing costs and increase response rates. For more information, check out my article Identify Your Target Audience.



• If your products or services are cheaper than everyone else, now is the time to shout about it! Many small businesses - particularly in the service sector - are able to undercut their larger rivals so make sure everyone knows you're cheaper by making this the main focus of your marketing.



• Offer discounts or special offers. If business is slow then selling at a discount is preferable to selling nothing at all. However, you want to prevent people putting your advert or leaflet to one side and forgetting about it... you want them to act NOW! So give them an offer they can't refuse but only if they're willing to act quickly. Set a 'valid to' date (the shorter the timescale, the better) or limit the offer to the first 25 or 50 orders.



• There are many effective ways to promote your company at very little cost, however these methods can be quite time consuming... which is why your competitors probably don't bother. To promote my leaflet printing company I always carry a supply of full colour A6 flyers: I pin them to notice boards at supermarkets, pubs and gyms; I post them through letterboxes as I walk down the high street; I leave them in phone boxes, coffee shops and lifts; I even visit the library and place them inside books on the subject of marketing and business promotion. Although it takes a fair bit of leg work it's a really successful - and above all cheap - way of drumming up business.



• Club together with other companies offering complementary services and share the cost of producing and distributing a leaflet. Even if you only strike a deal with one other company, you could halve your marketing budget in a stroke! But be careful, only choose companies with a very similar target audience otherwise you could be wasting money promoting your business to people who will never become customers.



• Whatever form of promotion you choose, always test, test and test again. Don't make the mistake of spending your entire budget on an advert or leaflet only to find that your carefully written message doesn't provoke any response. Far better to test two different versions with slightly different offers or wording, find out which produces the best response and then repeat the exercise until you're confident you've got your message just right. When times are tough, you can't afford to throw away cash so make sure you're onto a winner before you blow your budget!