Atinitonews.com : Philippine News Feature - Marketing Decisions During Recession

Marketing Decisions During Recession – To Spend Or Not
by Marissa Buyco-Corpus

During economic climates such as that of the present time where world markets have shrunk and demand for goods and services have equally gone down due to the economic downturn, job losses and turmoil in major financial markets, entrepreneurs and companies face the difficult task of steep competition among a smaller market.

The simple rule during recession is avoid cutting the marketing budget. Why ? Your competitors will most likely pull back on marketing, thus giving you a chance to gain more customers and market share. It is normal for companies to reduce their marketing budget to save and cut down on costs. This is usually the most affected expense item in corporate budgets. But look at the newspapers advertisements for cars - in a shrinking auto industry, most auto dealers have doubled their efforts to sell more cars – but with major reductions in prices in order to entice buyers to make an auto buying decision.

However, marketing bosses have the tough decision to figure out ways to do more with less budgets - Scotia Bank’s tag line “ You’re richer than you think “ seems to work before and during recessionary periods. Customers hear of the ad and try to seek advise from their bank on how to make maximum use of their resources. So clients are encouraged to get a second opinion from their bank on managing their finances.

With the recession, we notice steep discounts from all apparel, shoes and accessories. The regular Sears Days ads have been going on for years that its effectiveness doesn’t seem to work anymore. But every week, we are drowned by numerous flyers from Walmart, Canadian Tire, Shoppers Drug Mart Price Chopper, Loblaws, etc. Where before buyers would throw these to the trash, nowadays we see many going through these to find great deals in order to save on money. So these marketing tools do work during tough times. I saw someone collect all the flyers and compare prices and bring them all to Walmart because Walmart has a price match guarantee and by bringing the flyers from competitors, this buyer is saving money and buying only from one place ( unlike most who buy pop from Shoppers, toilet paper from No Frills and Ice cream from Metro etc).

With the effectiveness of marketing tools during recessionary times, it is also wise for entrepreneurs to select which media to advertise with more effectiveness, thus maximizing their dollar.

The decision to spend or not highly depends on the type of product or service and the effectiveness of marketing on sales and customer action and reaction.

There is no simple yes or no answer to this question. The answer is...it depends.

Marissa Corpus has BSBA and MBA degrees from the University of the Philippines and post graduate studies in Financial Management from the Netherlands International Institute of Management. She is Managing Director of Philippine Multimedia Productions publisher of the Filipino Telephone Guide, MBC Immigration Specialists, Servicio Filipino Internationale and a licensed immigration consultant being a FULL member of Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants and CAPIC. Her company was 2006 Philippine awardee as the Best Immigration Consultancy Specialist by the NPQEA. To contact writer, email her at mbcorpus@yahoo.com , check her website at www.mbcimmigration.ca or telephone at 416-266-3838 or 416-264-7676.