Setting up a Shingle

I’ve written before about the hit that marketing, advetising, and public relations takes during a recession. I serve on the Board for PRSA-MD, and half of the Board members have gotten laid off this year. This statistic is also high for our members. With a plethora of talented advertising, marketing, and public relations professionals glutting the workforce, hitting up against a limited number of available jobs, particularly for senior-level professionals, it’s no wonder that more and more advertising, marketing, and public relations mavens are deciding to set up shop on their own.

Some advice:

Find your niche. Have you dealt with alot of restaurants? Maybe a larger percentage of your past work has been with automotive? Do you have alot of experience planning large events? Small events? Whatever it is, find your niche, and market it. Just like any large company, you need to differentiate yourself from all the other sole practitioners out there.

Professionalism. Answer voicemails and e-mails promptly. Put together a slick Web site. Have business cards made up. From day one, put your best foot forward - after all, in this industry, more than any other (other than the straight beauty industry), impressions have a huge impact.

Hit up your contacts. Hey, it can’t hurt, and it may even help. Get the word out that you’re providing your considerable knowledge and experience under your own name. You never know who knows who, or who has heard of what opportunity.

Network. Join a professional group, join a local networking group, attend career educational events. Come armed with business cards.

Elevator speech. Have your standard ‘elevator speech’ - a one or two sentence description of what your company does, and why you do it better than anyone else - down pat.

Essentially, start out with how you want to finish. Take the time to put together a business plan - it will guide all your decisions.

Good luck!

Advertising in a Recession

It seems that when a recession arrives, the first things to go are marketing, advertising, and public relations: the staff, the budget, the strategy. However, this is probably the worst move a company can make in a down economy.

This is proven fact. The companies who continued to advertise during the 1980 to 1985 recession had a 256% growth by recession end over their competitors that had stopped or decreased ad spending, per a study by McGraw-Hill Research.

By ’staying in the game,’ you’ll be the lone gunman, so to speak. You’ll be the voice the customer sees, versus your competitors, who have all stopped advertising. Talk about cutting through the clutter!

Plus, not only will you be able to attract more customers by 1) being the only ones advertising and 2) offering them deals, but you’ll also be able to get some deals yourself on ad spending. When no one else is doing spending ad money, the radio stations, TV stations, and print publications cut their costs in the hope of attracting customers - you.

Don’t fall victim to the lure of saving money by cutting your marketing, public relations, and advertising budgets. Rather, keep that budget in place, and actually earn more money - and  more long-term customers - for your business by keeping your brand in the forefront of your customers’ mind.