Deer-in-the-headlights marketing: do what you are

Posted on | October 24, 2008 | Comments Off

So, one of the things that you have probably been hearing a lot about in the last two weeks — and you’re going to keep hearing about it as the economy continues to sour — is that you should absolutely, positively maintain your marketing regime.

And I know a lot of microbusiness owners who become distressed by that advice. I’m broke, they say. How can I keep up my marketing when I’m broke? I have to save every penny to pay for overhead, I can’t afford to continue my marketing.

Enter the deer in the headlights, stage left. Bow to the audience …

On a certain level, it’s like that fairly often when it comes to marketing advice, isn’t it? You get advice about what you have to do in order to keep going, except that it feels like you can’t follow that advice because it takes resources that you don’t have.

I’m doomed, you think.

But you’re not, really. A lot depends on which activities you believe fall under the category of ‘marketing,’ doesn’t it? Because, as Mary often says (and as I like to remind you), everything you do is marketing.

And, as she points out with this example, what you do is often a much clearer indicator of what you’re about than what you say anyway (or what you write in your marketing copy).

So, if everything you do is marketing and if what you do doesn’t match what you say, then your marketing isn’t going to be effective, is it?

What-you-do marketing is probably the clearest expression of your values that people receive.

If you make heavy work over how important your customers are to you, but

said customers find that your online contact form generates a canned auto-response thanking them for their feedback and telling them that somebody will get back to them within 7-10 business days –

or if a prospect comes to your web site and cannot locate any information about you and your company, or the information they do find is so riddled with corporate jargon and marketing-speak as to be meaningless –

or if another prospect comes to your web site and cannot find any information on how to get in touch with a real human being (no phone number, no address and no name behind the company) –

or if a simple Google search for your company’s name comes up with a mess of public complaints (via blog posts and twitter, say), revealing that you have a pretty cavalier attitude toward customer issues –

or if, very simply, you provide your phone number but you don’t answer your phone –

nobody is going to believe all that guff about how much you cherish your customers, are they?

(Pause for musical interlude … )

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On the other hand, if you actually do cherish your customers, you don’t even really have to spend a bucket of money on marketing campaigns talking about it, do you?

What do you mean, if that’s all you do, nobody is going to know about it? Of course they will. People talk, remember?

(Besides, in the current economic climate, the care and feeding of your current customers is critically important.)

So be what you are. Act on what you care about. Both customers and prospects will see from that what matters to you.

Fairly often, that is the most effective kind of marketing to be had.

Not only that, but you’ll be sleep better knowing that you are keeping up your marketing even in tight times, just like the experts say.


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Category: Friday Musical Interludes, Marketing
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