Let’s get the bad news over with: To say that the U.S. economy is facing the most challenging economic time since the Great Depression is not an overstatement. Last week, employers shed almost 600,000 jobs. Today, 11.6 million Americans are out of work. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate has officially risen to 7.6%.

“This is the largest 13-month job loss since the payroll employment series began in 1939,” Christina Romer, the head of President Obama’s White House Council of Economic Advisers, said in a statement on February 6, 2009. “These numbers, and the very real suffering of American workers they represent, reinforce the need for bold fiscal action. If we fail to act, we are likely to lose millions more jobs and the unemployment rate could reach double digits.” Read article…

8 Inexpensive Marketing Strategies

From © Kelley Robertson, for About.com

In a recent marketing workshop I attended, I discovered that most business owners rely on just two or three marketing strategies to attract new business. However, there is a multitude of ways to drive new business to your door. Here are a few:

Networking. Networking is perhaps the most commonly used approach by small business owners. However, it is often poorly executed. Many people attend a networking function and take the wrong approach by trying to meet as many people as they can. They bounce from person to person, handing out business cards like it is an Olympic event and they are vying for the gold medal. They fail to realize that the most effective way to network is to cultivate relationships and give referrals to other members first. Read article…

By Susan Ward, About.com

Business promotion is to running a successful business as practicing scales is to playing the piano well; it may not be a thrilling activity in itself, but you just have to do it! You should spend at least an hour a day on business promotion or planning how to promote your business (and more is better, if you can fit the time in)!

You promote your business by getting the word out. The first axiom of business promotion is that you have to do this consciously. You can’t rely on other people to do it for you, no matter how great your product or service is.

The second axiom of business promotion is that like every other aspect of your business, it’s a budgeted activity. But business promotion doesn’t have to be expensive. Here are ten inexpensive ways to promote your business; all most of these will cost you is some time. Read article…

Turn the Recession into a Marketing Opportunity

By JOHN GRAHAM

Have you noticed how quickly so-called ‘business leaders’ can turn into wimps? They strut their stuff when the economy is booming, making it clear their success is of their own making. But when things turn sour, they run for cover, blaming company failures on circumstances beyond their control. Out of desperation, they layoff workers, cut benefits, slash budgets — including marketing.

Not every company capitulates in the face of an economic storm. Take these, for example. Wal-Mart, Hewlett-Packard, Procter & Gamble, and Apple all have one thing in common: they are all excellent, unrelenting marketers — and they lead the competition in their categories. In other words, they refuse to hunker down. Read article…

This content from: Duct Tape Marketing

Get Closer to Your Customers Now

What the heck, the phone’s not ringing like it was this time last year, something must be up. In good times it’s easy to get lazy and one of the first things to go is that genuine, I really appreciate your business and want to see how I can make your life better, approach to serving customers.

Okay, so customers are getting a little pickier with how they spend their money. Now is the time to reach out and get closer to those customers and let them know you are in it with them right now.

We all know we should be doing this kind of action systematically, good times and bad, so take your renewed customer focus and set-up processes that make sure you never lose it again.

Call 5/day and thank them

Go through your customer list and call 5 per day and thank them for their business. Get in the habit of calling customers and asking what more you could do - send hand-written notes. Apologize for ignoring them if you have!

Admit you’re slower

Address the slow-down in business and openly talk about ways to create win-win buying situations and offers.

Segment them

Not all customers are created equal, so treat them that way. Your most profitable, referring customers should get VIP treatment. You don’t have to downgrade anyone, just make sure your best customers know who they are.

Bring them together

Often your customers are peers and might enjoy the opportunity to commiserate with a group of peers, or at least network, over lunch.

Create a marketing board

Your best customers are probably advocates for your business, whether you know it or not. Create an informal board of your most involved customers and ask for their input and accountability in the development of your marketing strategies and tactics.

Get out from behind the computer and go out there in your customer’s world and get a better understanding of what they are going through and you can create loyalty that will bond you beyond price shopping.

By Kirby Hasseman

“In recent years, we small business owners have seen some tough times. And many parts of the country have not been strong economically since before 9/11. In times like this, the first instinct of many small business owners is to cut their marketing way back … or out completely. This is a huge mistake. As I once heard someone say, “Cutting out advertising to save money is like stopping your clock to save time.” If you are not constantly marketing your business, you soon won’t have a business to worry about.”  Read article.

This content from: Duct Tape Marketing

Adding a Chief Conversation Officer

“Markets are conversations - talk is cheap, silence is fatal” - from the cluetrain manifesto - Levine, Locke, Searls & Weinberger

The statement above embodies for many the changed landscape of marketing. Bigco started to embrace this over the course of the last few years and now it’s time for Smallco to aggressively do the same.

This year’s next position for many small business should be a conversation officer - someone in charge of the story.

That officer could be employed to create, curate and sometimes manipulate the conversations that must be coming from your company. In the broad sense the duties of this position should include

Content - this one is pretty simple - full fledged blogger, article publisher, white paper creator and education based marketing materials and webinar creator.

Context - this one is a little trickier, but your conversation officer should employ RSS technology to aggregate and filter the content and conversations going on in every online and offline corner and package it to make it more useful for your organization and your prospects.

Connection - your CCO should be in charge of developing ways to include your customers and partners in the building of your business for mutual benefit. Your CCO should be in charge of the conversations your customers are having after they buy, as they decide to buy more and in the process of becoming a referral source.

Community - your conversations must eventually come together as community. You must facilitate conversation among your prospects and customers, introduce partners and find ways to co-create value. Intentionally hosting the conversation your customers are having with each other is a must.

The primary toolset for this new position is indeed social media, but don’t neglect traditional forms of conversation as well. twitter, Facebook, blogging and RSS must supplement phone calls, lunch and handwritten notes to produce the ultimate, full-bodied, authentic, value-based conversation.

Perhaps you can’t yet invest in a full-time employee to carry out this position, add it to the org chart and start developing the position, because it’s no longer an optional function.