Advertising: the ultimate weapon: strategies for a down market.

• Author: Johnson, J. Douglas

STRATEGIES FOR A DOWN MARKET

Advertising: The Ultimate Weapon

Indiana advertising executives say now is the time to stick with your marketing plan and pick up some easy market share.

Everybody has a damage-control agenda for this bumpy recession-time situation. Near the top of many people's list is: "What to do about advertising?" The knee-jerk reaction may be: "Cut the budget to boost the bottom line." Next to that notion you should blue pencil: "Better not! No way!"

"Don't panic!" says a self-proclaimed proactive, Ronald K. Pearson, president of Pearson, Crahan & Fletcher Group Inc. in Indianapolis. "I tell people some of the finest opportunities in business are available during partly cloudy times like these. By simply staying with your business plan you can pick up market share that will take the folks who stick their heads in the sand five or 10 times the investment to gain back during healthier times."

Pearson grabbed the lead in trying to steady skittish marketers by staging a pair of pep rallies to counter the jitters. These meetings may be unique, perhaps the first in the country.

Pearson combined forces in the project with The Indianapolis Star and The Indianapolis News, WRTV Channel 6, other media and advertising agencies. They used six teaser TV commercials and five print advertisements designed to promote promotion. One headline read, "Today, Business Is Fierce." The copy went on, "Today, you have two choices. You either pull back and fade away. Or you decide you're in business to win and take advantage of the situation. The economy is tough right now. Yet this is the best time to improve your position. This is business. Not a game. Competition is fierce. The rules have changed. The people who react first and best will absolutely win." There was no signature.

Why plan these meetings and place these ads, anyway? "We're not promoting just our agency, or just Channel 6 or the Star-News. We're promoting advertising in general," Pearson explains. "I'd be less than honest if I said we did not want to help our own business, but we are concerned about all businesses. There is such a dramatic domino effect when one guy slows down."

Thomas A. Villing, president of Villing & Co. Inc. in Mishawaka, likes to share the parable about the hot dog vendor whose business grew and grew through aggressive marketing. When the vendor's son told him a great recession was coming, the man cut back his inventory, took down his signs and didn't hustle his...