With a looming recession, a lot of people are getting worried. Businessmen are wondering if they will be facing a challenging year. Particularly worried are those running B2B companies. What will a recession mean for their business?
This article will tackle the possible effects of recession on B2B companies. We will also go through some strategies to prepare a business for recession and cite examples of businesses, including a translation company to a large tech company that has managed to implement recession-proof marketing strategies.
Is Recession Certain?
There’s been a lot of talk about a recession happening. The question is whether it’s certain.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the United States is set to enter a recession in the next year. Right now, the United States Federal Reserve is doing what it can to counter the rising inflation. Granted, the inflation rate of the United States may not be as bad as in other countries but it is still bad enough that it is pushing up the prices of basic commodities.
Initially, economists were projecting that the US economy will grow slightly but now they are saying that the GDP will be contracting for two quarters. That would be the textbook definition of a recession. It is predicted that the GDP will contract by 0.2% for the first quarter and 0.1% in the second quarter.
There are those who are a bit more optimistic that the signs we are seeing now will not lead to a global recession. According to Jeffrey Roach, who is the chief economist of LPL Financial, while the economy is experiencing a downturn, they believe that the “decline in economic activity is not ‘significant’ in our view.”
However, other economic experts are not as optimistic. They believe that the world economy is already on the path to recession and it’s too late to avoid it.
How Will a Recession Impact B2B Companies?
How will a recession affect B2B companies? A downturn in economic activity means that businesses will be struggling. Many will cut down on the services that they are getting to focus on their main business.
B2B companies might see a downturn in the demand for their services because of the recession. Some businesses are already feeling the crunch now.
Finding New Clients During a Recession
It’s not easy to find new clients during an economic downturn. That is true whether a business is targeting consumers or other businesses. The challenge is just to ride out the recession until the economy bounces back again. It adds to the complication of the overall situation.
Recession-Proof B2B Marketing
The truth is that marketing is one of the first goals when a company suffers financially. An economic downturn is no exception. But cutting down on marketing during a recession is a mistake which can further hurt a company.
There are some strategies which can make marketing recession proof.
Make Your Marketing More Agile
A recession can last for many years and so deciding to wait it out before marketing again is not the smartest move. One way that you can make marketing effective even during a recession is to make it more agile.
For example, Tomedes, a translation company, is making its marketing more agile by expanding its services to other aspects of the language industry. Now, they’re marketing is no longer focused on a narrow segment. This translation company is diversifying the services it is offering and expanding its services by building new platforms. Its marketing is expanding as well, so it’s not just marketing as a translation company anymore.
Stop Campaigns with No Clear ROI
Are you running marketing campaigns with unclear ROI? Stop those and focus on campaigns with clear returns. A good example of this is IBM’s Every Second Counts campaign. While it uses multimedia and is very interesting visually, it is clearly targeting potential clients of the company. It can therefore deliver substantial ROI.
Use Account-Based Marketing Tactics
You need to switch to account-based marketing (ABM). Under this strategy, your marketing efforts will be focused on a certain target accounts. It uses customized marketing communications to reach individual accounts. This means very little resources will be wasted on leads that might not be converted at all. This is a great strategy to follow for a business that is trying to cut down on expenses because of the recession.
One of the best ABM success stories is LiveRamp which was able to raise over $50 in revenue just from 15 targeted accounts.
Those are just some of the strategies that you can use to mitigate the effects of recession on your business, particularly on your marketing. The negative impact of recession on a business cannot be overstated but if you know the right strategies to implement then you are on the right track. There is no such thing as a recession proof business but you can come close to having one but as you’ve seen from the examples of IBM, LiveRamp, and the translation company Tomedes, there are things you can do.
