chart lane

Ten things to cut before marketing in a recession – nos 9 and 10

Anyone who’s been following the series of articles designed to help marketers in the construction sector will know we’re close to the end. Of the series that is – not the world, although it might seem that way sometimes.

A recent CIMCIG study found that something like 10% of marketing positions in the construction sector had been dispensed with since the beginning of the year – which is a pretty serious number considering around 30% of the people still in marketing jobs are self-employed, and technically not able to ‘lose’ their job.

Ten things to cut in the recession before your marketing budget – no.8

Welcome to the continuation of our series of handy tools with which to defend your marketing budget at the increasingly difficult budget meetings. This time, we're turning our attention to the vast amount of cash that is wasted sending bits of paper here and there.

No. 8 Going postal

Businesses send a lot of post. Really a lot. The biggest senders are banks - mainly statements - 50m items a month. If they'd switched to e-mail before now, maybe they wouldn't have been in such trouble.

Ten things to cut in the recession, before you cut your marketing – no.7 – Golf Days

Mark Twain once described a game of golf as “a good walk spoiled”. Now, it’s not my cup of tea, but I know a lot of people do enjoy whacking a few balls around a bit of countryside, and being a believer in freedom, I would die for their right to do so. Well, maybe not quite, but you get the point.

However, when it comes to the Corporate Golf Day, my mind clouds as the red mist descends.

Ten things to cut in the recession, before you cut your marketing – no. 6 - IT

So there I was at my architect pal’s office, talking about the terrible state of the economy over a double-shot latte and some lovely little biscuits, when he said he’d just laid off his marketing resource.

“I read your piece”, he said, “you said to preserve your capability to actually do the work, so when it came to choosing between whether to cut a junior architect or the marketing manager, well, it was easy”.

I spluttered a little, but resisted the temptation to pour the latte over his stupid head and simply said “so, is that junior architect very busy then?” I could see, over his shoulder, that the team were playing with a new, elegant design of paper aeroplane, so I didn’t really need to wait for the answer.

Turning off the new-work tap, you see, is just as bad as removing your capability to do the work when you win it. “But what else could I have done?” he complained. Well.

No 6. IT Projects

Ten things to cut in the recession, before you cut your marketing – no. 5

This article was published on Construction News' website in February 2009.

Cutbacks continue. Pay freezes, even pay cuts, mass layoffs and general bad news are still the order of the day. And to cap it all, we’re not getting any interest on our savings. At last week’s CIMCIG conference, delegates were depressed by a morning of forecasting that lurched from pessimistic to suicidal.

But after the depression came the inspiration, a series of practical presentations on what you can do to build share, and future profit. In the end, the Conference Delegates went away armed with some new ideas and a steely determination to market their way out of the recession.

They will of course face opposition from their employers, who will question the spending of money on marketing. So still they will need to be armed with ammunition to protect and preserve their marketing resource. So it is with that in mind that we continue our series of ‘Oi, cut something else’.

No 5. Turn Stuff Off

Ten things to cut in the recession, before you cut your marketing – no. 4 - Executive Costs

Well, the New Year doesn’t seem to have made things any better out there. In fact, not only is the economic outlook just as bleak with Big Al now saying we’re in a ‘prolonged recession’, it’s even got colder.

So, of course, cutting back on those non-essential costs is just as high on the Boardroom Agenda as it was before Christmas. As usual at such times, the knives will be out for the marketing budgets.

But, as shown in previous articles, cutting marketing is a ‘bad thing’, it leads to less business in the future. So here’s the latest idea in our series of ‘Oi, cut something else’.

Ten things to cut in the recession, before you cut your marketing – no. 3 - Administration

As times get worse in the construction industry – which is now 70,000 jobs lighter according to reports – it becomes even more important to cut those costs to the bone. But even at this time, we need to be thinking about positioning for the recovery. So we need to make sure that while we cut to the bone, we don’t cut deeper, and weaken our basic structure.

Ten things to cut in a recession - no. 2 - Meetings

As published on Construction News' website, 17 October, 2008.

As regular consumers of this column will know, CIMCIG champions the sensible continutation of marketing activity in tough times.

Without boring you with the details again, it's been shown that companies who continue their marketing activity in recessions take market share from those that don't - and keep it once the recession is over.

But of course when times are hard, companies do need to pull in their belts, so we're prepared a series of 'cut that first' ideas.

Ten things to cut in the recession, before you cut your marketing - no.1 - Association Membership

From Construction News' Website - www.cnplus.co.uk- October 2008

For the last few weeks I’ve been banging on about the recession, and how important it is to keep your marketing going through it, in order to come out the other side in a better position than you are now. “That’s all very well”, you’ve been saying, “but we need to make some cuts, or we’ll be going bust. What do you suggest?”

So, here goes the first in a short series of money saving ideas.