When times become difficult, your external business support systems are challenged.

There is pressure from every angle and you need good foundations to be able to weather the storm. There is no point using more junior staff for systems such as your marketing if those people are not equipped to create the resilience that you need.

Marketing vision and excellence comes through experience coupled with proven teaching. The Chartered Institute of Marketing (CIM) are the most recognised body within the UK for marketing qualifications. In order to be able to correctly support businesses you need to work with someone who has both the theoretical experience from the CIM at a high level (ME) and the real life practical hands on experience too. Just having the training is not enough. It is just like working on a car…you can read a book on how to fix an engine but unless you have done it yourself practically and come across the problems that can occur in real time, you are not equipped to correctly problem solve.

The focus here needs to be on outcomes. In terms of your marketing the outcome you need is likely customer satisfaction and repeat purchase. Therefore, you need to work with someone who prioritises your customer but also your internal business needs as well.

You need to work with someone who is experienced in crisis marketing and who can adapt your business story for the customer benefit.

You need to risk mitigate and you need marketing contingencies coming out of your ears. I work with my clients to build a strong and resilient marketing tool box that includes a whole host of marketing collateral that can be used at any time. This negates the need for constant briefs and design work. This is your armoury.

You need a promotional calendar and promotional tools even if historically you haven’t offered this sort of thing and it doesn’t fit with your brand guidelines. You need to be prepared to serve your customer come what may. Now is the time to take action with your marketing and stock your reserves. Consistent communication that you are absolutely accountable for will give you strength and resilience. Here we are trying to protect the competitive advantage you have built up over the years because to see that dwindle or deplete would be a terrible thing after all of the efforts you have already put in to protect your customer database.

One of the issues with more junior/less qualified marketers is that you can spend money on tactics that aren’t matched with your bigger business vision. This can make you feel like you are doing the right thing by your customer but actually you are just ticking a box in your head so that you feel like you are doing something. Generally Junior marketers do not have the foresight or experience to be able to plan ahead and account for all of the commercial challenges that may lie ahead simply because they haven’t had the exposure to local and global businesses where they have seen the pressures that can occur in every department.

If you would like to create some business resilience with someone who understands you your business your customer and what you need from your marketing here I am.