It’s been a crazy past few years for most business owners, and on top of that, experts are continuing to predict economic doom and gloom in the years to come. 😵💫 As you continue building your business, how do you practically prepare for the worst while hoping for the best? Thankfully, there are direct steps you can take to recession-proof your marketing efforts and Soulheart is here to help you leverage marketing and get ahead of the curve.
Let’s dive into how to build a recession-proof marketing strategy that will keep the growth and results coming, even in an unpredictable economy.
Six Steps to Success in Times of Recession
Let’s Get Personal
Don’t underestimate the power of humanizing your brand. One of today’s biggest market values is customer service and making your audience feel like they can trust you. Customers want to feel validated, and you can distinguish yourself from the crowd by using a personal, trustworthy tone in your marketing.
You’ll also want to leverage what you do that nobody else does in your marketing, i.e. explaining why you have the unique solution your potential customer is looking for. When you work to make a genuine, personal connection with leads and customers, they’ll be more confident in your knowledge of their needs and ability to fulfill them.
Utilize Emails
Emails are an effective tool to build and sustain business during a recession. We’ve all got lots to do, so automating your emails is a move that will save you precious marketing hours.
Building out strategic, personalized email campaigns can engage and retain customers, and research suggests that increasing customer retention rates by even 5% can bring in 25% to 95% more in profits.
Learn more in our blog on email automation.
Track Data
Data gathering and tracking tools like Google Analytics and HubSpot are super helpful to provide intel on your market. When you can make marketing decisions based on data-driven insights, you cut a lot of trial and error time and streamline your process.
New factors impact the market all the time, especially during a recession when trends can be unpredictable. Data analysis is key to navigating this! Analyzing your competitors can also help you fill in the gaps they are leaving open in the market.
HubSpot is the powerful marketing software that we use to track data for our emails, social posts, ads, etc. They also offer learning tools that have taught us how to read the data and become better marketers! You don’t have to know all the ins and outs of your marketing data, but it’s a good idea to lean on tools like HubSpot to learn how your business is performing when facing a recession.
Invest in Content Marketing
Prioritizing content marketing is how you build rapport and credibility with your customers, no matter which stage of the customer journey they’re in. When you continue giving your audience value through educational, inspirational, or entertaining content, they’ll stick around even when times get tough.
Content marketing includes things like blogs, newsletters, and of course social media posts that get your brand in front of more people. This is one piece of the marketing puzzle that can’t be overlooked, even in a recession, because it keeps your customer funnel full and will help you thrive in unpredictable seasons.
Retarget Your Audience
The old saying is true — time is money! And accurately assessing your brand and target audience can save you both. When you know exactly what you’re offering and to whom, you can target the audience that’s most likely to convert to paying customers. It takes time to find the right parameters for your target audience, but building customer personas and analyzing your brand positioning will help prepare you for anything.
Customers are people with a need or problem, and they’re looking to you for a solution! As you work to target the right audience, remember to address their needs and be someone they can trust.
Don’t Change the Budget
It’s instinctual during a recession to want to hold our budgets a little tighter, but research shows that staying aggressive in marketing spending is well worth the risk because of the ROI it pays out. Overall customer spending holds surprisingly steady even in recessions, so maintaining—even increasing—marketing spending will keep you moving forward.
Soulheart is passionate about helping your business reach its potential, even through unexpected seasons. Want to learn more about recession-proofing your marketing efforts? We’d love to connect with you and find out how we can help!
