Are you feeling the heat of the recession? Not sure how to tackle it? Read on…
You must have heard – “When the going gets tough, the tough get going!” The best way to counter the effects of the recession is to take control and initiate positive action steps that will not only help you ride out the recession but you will come out a winner!
- At first, you should remind yourself that you did not create the recession and you cannot rid the world of it. Stop feeling down and out and concentrate all your energy on making the best of it. “When life hands you lemons, turn them into lemonade.“
- Don’t stop marketing – do more of it. When everyone around you is cutting down on marketing, it is easier and cheaper to be in the limelight and your prospects will see more of you than others. This will create a ‘top of mind’ recall when they are finally ready to order.
- Set up and improve processes for everything your company does. Right from customer acquisition to customer sign-off and all internal activities should be highly process driven to squeeze the maximum efficiency out of the scarce opportunities and resources.
- Cut down the dead wood. Get rid of non-performers, whether these are low response marketing avenues or low performance employees. Redeploy people to other departments where they can produce better output. It is very painful, sometimes bordering on insensitive. However if a tree won’t save itself from dying, it won’t be able to provide food and shelter to anyone. One who tries to please everyone, pleases no one.
- Identify seasonal lean periods in your business if you have any. Run special promotions at these times to keep your teams busy.
- Make sure you announce offers only periodically. I know a company which has either a 60% off promotion or a 50%+20% off promotion running at all times. Also, don’t extend your offers ad-infinitum or they will lose their urgency factor.
- Use the lean periods to invest in training your teams on upcoming technologies so that they are fighting fit when markets improve and there is a demand in the market for these technologies.
- Service businesses can redeploy some part of their teams to create innovative products when demand for their service is low.
These strategies will help you ride out the storm and you will come out stronger when the sentiments have improved – as they eventually will. No recession has ever lasted for ever – nor will this.
What strategies and tactics are you employing to tackle the monster? Please share your tips with your fellow readers by commenting below.