Marketing Innovation in a Recessionary Business Climate
Aug 22nd, 2008 by Paul Miser
We’re all feeling it. The recession, coupled with the slow summer sales are leaving us all with questions floating around in our head. But what can we do to combat these times? In his recent blog post, “What Do You Do When Old Media Vehicles Are Losing Effectiveness And New Media Vehicles Are Not Proven And Generally Lack Measurement?” Idris Mootee discusses some ideas to move in the right direction.
Mootee discusses the difference in thought, forecasting, and marketing ROI between CFOs and CMOs. This major difference is due to the declining effectiveness of ‘traditional marketing’ strategies coupled with their difficulty to track and analyze results. Basically, CFOs are holding CMOs responsible for showing marketing ROI and the traditional marketing strategies and measurements aren’t holding up. Not only are the measurements hard to obtain, but, as Mootee points out, “In a recessionary climate, advertising is generally less effective and these traditional ’shouting loud’ and ‘buy me” ads are not working.”
So, if traditional marketing isn’t working right now, what is? As always, word of mouth and recommendations from friends, family, and trusted sources online are the most effective marketing strategies. This, my friend, is what social media is all about. Being able to engage customers in a social media environment will create this word of mouth strategy that will thrive in this recessionary environment. Not only that, but social media and online marketing strategies are extremely easy to track, analyze, and measure marketing ROI. By tracking these social conversations with each individual consumer, we can create, build, and continue an engaging conversation and relationship with that consumer that will turn into brand loyalty and advocacy. Not bad for a recessionary economy.
So, why are we not seeing more of this? The short answer is Fear. There is a lot of risk using new, emerging, unproven marketing strategies; a risk that many CMOs think will either make or break their career so they tend to not stray too far from traditional activities. Mootee says, “And in times like this, it is the true test of a great CMO who pushes for innovation on all marketing fronts. It forces people to think hard about ‘customer value’ and look for ways to refine existing product concepts and produce something better or cheaper… By the time the recession is over, thousands of new businesses and new jobs will have been created and the economy will emerge stronger than before. That is because recessions — despite the pain — are times of creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship. If you believe in what you can do and dream big, this is the time.”
