Recession isn't a marketing tactic

Marketers: Stop sending promotions that start with in these tough times, how to market in a recession, or any other bad economy-themed promotion.

It's boring, it's irrelevant, and it's already cliche.

If you want to sell more in a tough market, your job is to be positive. 

Show me how your product will make me money, make me more successful, and make me happier. We'll buy when you show us benefits. Which, of course, is what all marketing is supposed to do, in any economy. 

When you start with the cheesy tough-times opening, you just bury your sale under a depressing message. It doesn't exactly encourage people to buy.

Comments

Jen Harris said... (Dec 23, 2008 4:12:24 PM)

Yes, but isn't "WE ARE GOING TO MAKE YOU CRAP LOADS OF MONEY" or "I MADE $200,000 MY FIRST MONTH" worse?
Kidding -
I get where you are going, so what I ask our potential customers is: what are you doing NOW to come out on top when we get out of this recession?
Helping people make the right decisions to be successful in the future resonates more, than with a "recession" band-aid.

Nathan Gilliatt said... (Dec 23, 2008 4:25:00 PM)

Get 'em, Andy. While you're at it, would you help me lobby for the tax on headlines that end with "in a down economy"? Thanky.

Adam Hanin said... (Dec 23, 2008 4:35:35 PM)

Amen. I had this exact discussion with one of our sales reps the other day. His perspective - we need to let people know we can help them in a tough economy... "now more than ever". My message - we help them all the time... we're going to keep our messages positive and focus on benefits. Thanks for your thoughts. They're right on target!

Douglas Karr said... (Dec 23, 2008 5:54:41 PM)

Hi Andy,

Going to have to disagree with you here. As a SaaS provider, our target audience are companies who are chopping marketing budgets and staff and wish to maintain the same volume of inbound leads as they were under much looser circumstances.

We're speaking about the recession quite a bit with the companies were developing strategies with - and winning a lot of business in the meantime.

Doug

David M. Patt, CAE said... (Jan 5, 2009 9:59:20 PM)

Good advice. But if your market is thinking negatively you may need a clever twist to get it to think more positively.