I was checking the blog to Guy Kawasaki, and read his article on the OPEN Forum by American Express blog.
Here is a quote:
Today, I am providing a list of what you should say to your employees as a small business owner and entrepreneur. These statements indicate that you are clueful and on top of things.
“I’m assuming we’ll never raise another nickel.” The truth is that unless your company is generating kick-ass revenues, venture capitalists are going to squeeze: on the one hand, they don’t want their investments diluted with outside investors, but they don’t want to give you more capital from their funds. Welcome to tech entrepreneurship.
“The marketing budget is now $0, and we will figure out a way to get to market.” Maybe you have more than $0, but if you adopt a much better mindset. How can you use free resources, social media (Facebook, Twitter, Friendfeed, etc) to market your product on a shoestring budget?
Please read the complete article here.
But I had to commet the 2 point of his article. I do agree with him on most of the other point of his artice. These are tough times and this calls for strong leadership and smart mindsets. Here is my comment:
Putting the marketing budget down to $0 is just a good short term fix, with the sentiment that marketing spend can always be increased again later, without to much damage.
I don’t think this is a good idéa – and I don’t think the clients think so either. Marketing is a part of the solution, not the problem. What you sacrifice now, you “pay” for later.
And even though the company has $0 marketing budget, the amount of time the employers spend on social media platforms to do zero-cost marketing, has a indrirect high cost, since they are not producing products that gives revenue. W K Kellogs is a good example of this in the great depression. When all his rivals were cutting back, he continued marketing his cereals and pulled ahead in sales, becoming marked leader.
A change that hasn’t reversed.
By being smart in planning a good marketing strategy you can exceed your rivals sales and end up stronger and bigger.
Thinking points:
Do you agree with me, or with Guy on the marketing issue? Please tell me why?
