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Economic challenges and prolonged uncertainty has led many businesses to take an extremely conservative approach to managing expenses. While emphasis on cost-management in this environment has been appropriate, the area of “investment” most often compromised in the exercise has been marketing and advertising.

Whether it has been demonstrated in the postponed launch of new products or programs or in the direct reduction of budgets supporting them, this area of the business has been asked to make some of the heaviest sacrifices in attempts to restore short-term profitability. This short-term mentality, albeit a necessity in some instances, offers some unfortunate long-term realities. 

Many assume their competitors are responding to these market conditions in the same manner. In fact, that is often not the case. Aggressive, marketing-driven organizations recognize these conditions as an opportunity to cost effectively increase share of voice, build awareness, and build share of market. They are speaking up and differentiating themselves while their competitors go silent.

Business must go on. And building brand recognition and demand drives revenue. So how do you fight for share of voice and build or maintain your brand’s position in the market?

Assess the competitive landscape.

• Audit spending across all channels.
• Audit brand positioning.

Assess your current position.

• How does your media strategy compare?
• How is your brand differentiated?
• What are your marketable strengths?

Define your target audience.

• Look at their demographics. Have they remained the same or shifted?
• How are they responding to your competitors?

Establish your communications objective.

• Are you introducing a new product? Or building awareness of a new service?
• Make sure your communications objective is relative to your audience.

Develop your strategy and identify tactics to support.

• Brainstorm ideas to achieve your communications objective.
• Commit to a focused strategy.
• Identify tools and methods that can be developed in a feasible timeline and within your budget.

Develop and execute.

• Develop your primary focus by determining the one thing that sets you apart from your competition.
• Execute all tactics on the established primary focus.
• Establish a timeline for the execution of your tactics.

The above steps will assist you in re-entering the market with a strong advertising and marketing strategy.

To get started on strategic planning for your business, email .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).