5 tips to recession-proof your brand

#1 The best ambassadors of a business, employees and customers

When you’re running a business of your own, you must know exactly what you are offering and to whom. And to do it in such a manner to stick to this rule.

“I was listening this fall to a Heineken representative at a marketing forum. Obviously at that time (now too), people were hysterical about the economic crisis. Everybody but the Heineken representative. He was saying the company hadn’t changed its strategy but chosen to continue doing business as usual, despite the tough economic environment”, said Andreea Ionescu (photo), brand maker and managing partner at ConsultWare.

The good part of a recession, she continued, was that it forced people to reinvent themselves and the businesses they were running accordingly.

“Even if they scaled back on traditional media spending, and turned to social sites for promoting their services or products, in the end, the most important thing is that the best ambassadors of a business are the employees and customers”.

If your employees like your employer brand and your customers are satisfied with your services because you paid attention to their needs, your brand will never die, said the former Sensiblu marketing director.

#2 Invent the market you know how to play and win

The marketing professor at London Business School says we’re all too much obsessed with finding something to stand out with and communication and instead put the essential things aside.

“We must focus on the main roles first and make sure we’re doing a great job”, says Ionescu.

It’s crucial to know your mission, she continued, as well as knowing why you got into a specific market.

“One of the classic rules of doing business is that if you know how to play the market and win, it’s perfect. And if you get ahead of your peers, it’s important to try to invent the market and be a road opener”.

#3 Adjust your communication strategy for your clients� wishes

For a solid brand, customers have important things to say. In fact, customers are the ones that call the shots, they take the reins of what a business leader should do or say to target audience.

“The important thing is to look at the way your clients prefer to communicate. If you fail to strengthen the relation with your client, you might as well go home and do something else”, said Andreea Ionescu.

“It’s hard to say which of the jobs I liked best, because I never looked for a job I didn’t like. Each was challenging in its own way, but I can say that the job I have now I like the most, I am my own boss and when I look in the mirror in the morning, I say to myself: OK, now it’s time to get down to work”.

#4 You can handle your customer base with an Excel spreadsheet

“Customer relation management has grabbed most of the headlines lately. However, this doesn’t mean you should have a hi-tech database management software (only if you have 2 million customers)”, Ionescu added.

She says she’s seen people handling their customer base in Excel. The important thing is for them to look at the simple things – customers, where they come from, what they bought, how much they spent.

For the time being, ConsultWare doesn’t have too many customers, but the head of the company says she’s comfortable with the way things are now, and she wouldn’t change anything about them.

“If I were to change anything in my career, I thing I would open my own company sooner. Things would have probably looked differently now, if I had done it sooner.”

#5 The right proposition, right channel, with the perfect timing

“Give people the right proposition, through the right channel, with the perfect timing”, said Andreea Ionescu.

“Somebody asked me how did a marketing campaign I had managed achieve a response rate of 70%. Well, just like that. I identified the target consumer and watched the clock for the perfect timing. I have a friend who sells SMS-based communication software. He conducted a research and identified the opportune moments women are more willing to receive text messages and used the findings of his research in his campaigns. The conclusion is: in the end, to raise brand awareness, you don’t have to put a banner on the Capitol Hill to make your voice heard or your product known, or to pay millions on TV commercials. If you manage to stand out with your product, you’ll get customers and awareness”.