How to Keep Going in a Tough Economy

Anyone who has played a sport has heard their coach say, “when the going gets tough, the tough get going.” The athlete’s reaction to this simple statement says a lot about their character. If you never were an athlete, you might have heard Billy Ocean sing about this. Yet, how does this apply to marketing professional services? Are we tough? Do we need to get going?


The coach was talking about mental toughness as opposed to anything physical. Attitude has a lot to do with our success as marketing services professionals. For many professionals, it is time to invest in an attitude adjustment as a first step.

In times of trouble, management turns to marketing. What happens when we project a “glass is half full” mindset? What happens when our sense of pride responds with, “it’s not marketing’s fault. Things are tough out there. Competition is fierce." While management doesn’t look to marketing to be cheerleaders, sometimes we need to cheer. We also need to be on the same page with management when defining the “it.”

“When other companies simply battened down the hatches, seeing only risk during the recession, the more successful competitors found opportunity and pressed their advantage… "  (Source The McKinsey study; an independent report, that studied nearly 1,000 companies over an 18-year period (1982–99) including the US recession of 1990 to 1991,which showed that companies who increased their marketing expenditures in a recession were the only ones whose profits rose substantially when the economy recovered.) Sounds a lot like the tough kept going.

When management calls you in to say that marketing resources need to be reduced once again, you need to be prepared to tell management what marketing can do to make sure that business grows in the coming year. Are you prepared for this? Management needs marketing to offer tough love with an attitude that this (recession) too will pass. As your competitors are cutting their losses through marketing resource reductions, your battle plan needs to make better use of the marketing resources at your disposal. If management isn’t challenged, your budgets will face the consequences.

What is different with the marketing of professional services firms today? Since the last significant industry recession occurred in the 1980’s, many marketing professionals today weren’t exposed to its realities. Living through an experience is very different than reading about it in a white paper. Therefore, on one level we have less experienced individuals at many firms. However, this does not even take into account the firms that have replaced marketing professionals with other professionals as part of cost-cutting measures. I know several engineering firms that have asked principals or senior project managers to split their billable hours with corporate marketing tasks. 

After all, how hard is it to show your clients and prospects that your firm is able to withstand the hard times? Numerous studies over the years have shown that, on average, it costs five times more for a professional services firm to find a new client than to keep an old one. Focus on the significance of that statement; it is one of the most powerful concepts in the world of marketing professional services.

Yet, can replacements accomplish the same results as marketing professionals? Or, can professionals with less than 7 years of industry experience bring context to marketing needs?

How effective were the replacements when the NFL had its last lockout? Professional services firms that have chosen this path face two obstacles: expertise and focus. Some have discovered the inherent problems with this approach and are now looking to hire experienced marketing professionals. Because of the dismal results of the past three years, many are even elevating the role to chief marketing officer status. This is a good sign in the industry. However, CMO needs to be more than a title.

A seasoned professional with vision for client service and an action plan for acquiring and retaining clients when the economy is recovering is the investment many firms are looking to make. These are the people who keep going when things are tough. The talent that knows when to cheer and how to leverage resources. Professionals who have expertise in both marketing and business development. Are you in this position today? If not, do you have the roadmap to arrive? The Chinese proverb tells us that “the journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step.” For marketing services professionals, the first step begins with attitude. The journey should include equipping, training and mentoring to fill in any gaps along the way. Attitude, character and passion for learning are the leverage points that elevate someone with less industry tenure above those with more. Great ideas and creative solutions don’t hurt either.  Aristotle put it this way nearly 2400 years ago, ""We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act, but a habit."

How to Measure Social Media and Discover New Clients

Who believes that management is skeptical about social media? Perhaps it is because they haven’t seen new clients or projects as a result of their efforts. It might have more to do with a lack of measurement tools. We should begin at the beginning.  How are industry marketing services professionals measuring the results of their social media endeavors? 


The smart money in social media is now on discovery and analysis rather than monitoring and analytics.

Why is this important for professional services firms? The industry is searching for actionable information in their social media activities. How many managers believe that marketing people are playing when they monitor social media sites like LinkedIn and Facebook? Yet, other networking activities are all about business. The promise of social media must start to bring networking results. But, like other marketing channels, it is simply another door clients can come through. Social media discovery helps you understand the most valuable characteristics of your clients. This understanding enables you to be relevant in your communications.  It sounds so easy. Maybe that is the problem with management, we sold it as an easy marketing operation.

Simply joining a social media site is not enough. It is like joining an allied industry (client-oriented) organization and never going to any meetings. The process is simple. You need followers. Followers are interested in content. You deliver compelling content on the social media sites and people will follow. Followers, followers everywhere, but not a client among them is management's concern. Therefore, social media is not about shouting at your clients, but becoming a magnet to draw them in.

Management needs to understand that social media is all about conversations and somehow becoming part of the conversation. Yet, what we need to measure is the context of the conversation. At a cocktail reception, do you just barge into a conversation between one of your clients and a prospect?  Probably not and social media requires a smilar etiquette. When management can see the relationship between the audience and the author (their thought leaders), the power of social media will be revealed. Unfortunately, most companies are currently promoting solutions that measure static counts of words, phrases and other text attributes, at the exclusion of context and theme. This is a huge issue, because when you separate words from context, you lose relevance and accuracy. Management is not only frustrated but they can claim that social media is a waste of time and money. It is your responsibility to change their minds.