Five Ways to Gain a Competitive Advantage—While Everyone Else Is Panicking

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		January 2009, Issue 59

Marketing Evolution
Five Ways to Gain a Competitive Advantage—While Everyone Else Is Panicking
By Joel Granoff, President & CEO, Be Greeted™; Rose Holston, SEO Coach, Aviso Communications; and Brian Massey, Conversion Scientist

Apply Extraordinary Urgency for Exceptional Results in 2009

Look for part 2 next month!
Scarcity breeds industry. Marketing budgets and resources are becoming scarce and the industrious are going to thrive.

Where should you be putting marketing dollars in 2009?

In the next issue of Marketing Watchdog Journal, Aviso Communications, Be Greeted and The Conversion Scientist team up again to offer their recommendations for the industrious business.

While your competitors are busy cutting costs arbitrarily, stay ahead of the pack. Make informed decisions about your marketing strategy and sharpen your blades strategically to make every one of your cuts count.

In every economic cycle, companies of all shapes and sizes cut their marketing budgets. Frequently, managers will make uninformed decisions; therefore, it's critical that your business is poised to capitalize on common mistakes your competitors will likely make. This opens the door for you to take market share away from them.

They'll cut their most expensive programs regardless of performance.
They'll cut programs by some arbitrary percentage.
They'll put new programs on hold.

Here are five ways to gain a competitive advantage while others are panicking about the economy.

1. Cut out the proven nonperformers.

We must be good listeners during these economic times. If you are responsible for the marketing budget and lead generation, the first place to start is with the sales team. What do they need most from you? How will you measure your contributions to help them meet their goals? Examine data from your Web analytics, e-mail marketing management tools, and anything else at your disposal to quantify how your marketing dollars are performing.

Be prepared to make changes quickly and be eager to try different things as long as you have the data to know what is going on and how the organization, as a whole, is benefiting (or not) from your actions.

2. Don't make cuts across the board.

The lazy way to cut marketing budgets is to whittle down your pay-per-click advertising spend, cut the number of tradeshows you'll attend this year, and maybe reduce the frequency of your direct mailers.

This is not the time to hedge your bets.

Kill the programs that don't have demonstrable returns. You can already hear the screams: "If we aren't at the tradeshow, everyone will think we're in trouble." Let them. And let your competitors spend their precious marketing dollars on that concern. Of course, if the sales team says, "We get most of our business from that tradeshow," then by all means, keep it.

What if you aren't sure if a program delivers? John Wanamaker, a U.S. department store merchant at the turn of the 20^th century, once noted, "Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don't know which half." Fortunately there are plenty of tools available to measure marketing effectiveness, even print and broadcast advertising. Those programs that deliver sales results should be expanded.

3. Concentrate on programs that move prospects through the sales funnel.

The classic marketing funnel starts with a large number of people who are "Aware" of your company and products. Some of these will move to the next level of the funnel and actively "Consider" your product to solve their problems. Of these, some will move to the bottom of the funnel, and take action by purchasing.

Most of your marketing programs are aimed at building awareness ("branding") or at closing the sale. Take the time to help educate your audience while they are considering the purchase. Every e-mail, every banner ad, and every radio spot should offer specific information to help the reader/listener make a better decision. Each time you deliver this information, ask for the business. For example, it might be more important to speak at a tradeshow (educate) than to exhibit (persuade).

Ask yourself two questions about your customers: "Why are they looking for what we offer now?," and "What do they need to know to feel comfortable buying?" You should easily be able to anticipate their questions and concerns and be ready to deliver the answers via live Web site chat, white papers, Webinars, newsletters, etc.

4. The company that knows, grows.

If you don't know which of your programs is delivering the goods, you're out of luck. Your only strategy is to begin putting measurable programs in place, or modifying existing programs so that you can measure their success.

Regardless of your situation, now is the time to invest in programs that give quick results. Many online marketing strategies can give you quick feedback.

For example, co-author Joel Granoff's company Be Greeted (www.begreeted.com) specializes in proactive live chat for lead-generation and sales support. By tailoring live chats for each stage of the funnel, Be Greeted not only captures hot sales leads at the moment a prospect is on the Web site, but also provides the data to know exactly what drove the prospects to the site and how efficiently they are being moved through the funnel. Pay-per-click marketing is another such example of a quick feedback medium.

Avoid programs that require a considerable investment up front. You need to be able to change course quickly as your competitors' missteps open market opportunities for you. If you have to print thousands of direct mail postcards or commit to many months of broadcast media for a program, you're not going to be fast enough on your feet during this volatile time.

5. Prune intelligently.

Prune your programs intelligently by focusing your spending on programs that actively move prospects through the sales funnel, deliver the best margins, or help close sales faster. Even though your budget is also shrinking, you're going to win the battle when you are deliberate and proactive, and prioritize based on results.

Look for part 2 next month!

Scarcity breeds industry. Marketing budgets and resources are becoming scarce and the industrious are going to thrive.

Where should you be putting marketing dollars in 2009?

In the next issue of Marketing Watchdog Journal, Aviso Communications, Be Greeted and The Conversion Scientist team up again to offer their recommendations for the industrious business.

Return to MWJ Home

About the Authors
Joel Granoff is President & CEO of Be Greeted, a chat lead-capture service that helps businesses get more leads, speed conversion and increase marketing ROI. Be Greeted specializes in proactive live chat for B2B and B2C companies, delivering a five-star welcome and concierge-class service to orchestrate the ultimate customer experience.

Rose Gardea Holston is an SEO Coach who teaches business owners and executives how to develop successful online marketing campaigns that fit their business goals and budget.

Brian Massey is a Conversion Scientist, showing businesses how to turn their Web traffic into leads and sales.

Marketing Watchdog Journal is a monthly newsletter from Bulldog Solutions, a lead optimization and lead management company dedicated to helping our clients generate more, better leads and turn them into revenue. We welcome your feedback on this newsletter's content and design, and encourage you to share your ideas for topics you would like us to cover in future issues. Please send your comments or questions about Bulldog Solutions to Amy Bills, Director of Field Marketing.