Web Promotion in a Recession

During this time of economic downturn, when business is diminishing and your counting every penny, it is essential to invest in your business’s future growth. The last 10 years have seen the world wide web grow into a whole new medium that wasn’t around during the last recession. Business is booming unbelievably online and the rate of the internet’s growth is matched only by the contraction rate of traditional enterprises.

The internet is primarily seen by the majority as a place to find either the solution to a problem, and answer, or the cheapest of an item. It is the perfect window shopping venue as it allows you to compare many shops in a few clicks. This has been a boon for many, but for others who do not sell on price it has worked against them.

One thing we know for sure is that the internet has traffic, and traffic is fairly easily measurable. We know where this traffic goes and what the people are looking for, and based on that, we can place websites in their path to meet the users needs. This method has become a great way of “buying” customers, which is essentially what every business does when they advertise. If you compare the cost of customer acquisition online to the equivalent amount of high street advertising, you will see that online, it is far more cost effective.

The companies that position themselves now by increasing their spend on marketing and promotion are the companies that will weather the storm of recession. The economy is forecast to contract by 3.5% this year before returning to some mythical Darling growth forecast in 2010. Whether this happens or not, is not the subject of this article, but if we see growth in 2010 then this will be the shortest, least damaging slump on record. After all, with 7% unemployment, we still have 93% in work, shopping and spending money.

Intelligent business owners in the country will be investing in market share during the slump during which time their competitors will be struggling to survive. Some companies are still growing in spite of the downturn, in order to be one of them, it’s as simple as moving with the times and taking advantage of the online oppertunities that are available.

It is said that in times of economic boom, every 10 you spend on adverts, you will return 19, in an economic dry spell however, you will return 51 for every 10 spent on advertising. This is because during a recession there are fewer businesses advertising, therefore there are more potential customers to be had with every advert.

The options available to increase website traffic include search engine optimization, which is the practice of positioning your website at or near the top of the Organic search engine rankings, primarily Google which accounts for over 80% of all search traffic. Pay Per Click Management involves positioning your website at or near the top of Googles paid listings. This is a near instant process unlike search engine optimization, but does depend upon you paying a sum each and every time your advert is clicked upon.

Combine both of the above with an email newsletter to keep your clients informed with what you are up to, a blog and article submission and you will build your self an online presence that will ensure that your company survives and thrives the current downturn.