COVID-19 is wreaking havoc on many businesses and that will continue for many weeks to come. Tragically, many small businesses and even some larger, unhealthy companies will not survive. But for those companies that are able to wait out our invisible enemy, I have an important recommendation that I want you to seriously consider. You probably won't hear this same suggestion from your business partner, your CFO or even from your marketing director if you are fortunate to have one.

A recession is likely to follow this period of temporary business closures, social distancing, and layoffs. Nobody knows how long it will last, but it is coming. Your company needs to tighten its belt and it should. No doubt you will be leaning on your CFO for his or her wisdom. "Across the board cuts!" they will say. "We should hunker down to ride this thing out," they'll advise. They are almost correct. You see, the CFOs who work for your competitors will be saying the same thing. Your competitors are going to reduce their expenses in all departments and, if I was a betting man, I would bet that marketing will be hit the hardest.

So, you know that your competitors will be on the sidelines for a while. They won't be launching new products or services. They won't be advertising. Even their trade show display will be smaller (if they return to event marketing at all). This presents you with a golden opportunity to gain market share, but there's a catch. You're not going to gain market share by cutting marketing like your competitors. During the recession, your business must increase its marketing.

You're skeptical. You're scared. I get it. And I don't expect you to just trust me on this one. If you do nothing else today, I want you to read this article, The Best Marketers Will Be Upping, Not Cutting, Their Budgets by Mark Ritson. In Mark's piece, he makes the case for this plan better than I can and he bases this strategy on a variety of research studies that show that companies who increase marketing during recessions gain considerable market share (that can be extremely difficult to acquire when times are good).

Take a look and let me know your thoughts. And if the fractional CMOs at Pinch Hit Partners can help you through this challenging time, I hope you will reach out to discuss your options.

By Mark Cipolletti, Pinch Hit Partners Founder and Fractional CMO

They say “it’s better to give than to receive.” That may be true, but when it comes to giving gifts to our business clients, it’s not just the thought that counts.

Our clients know we have ulterior motives and they often see our gifts as thinly veiled marketing and sales opportunities. So, like any marketing campaign, they scrutinize them and talk about what they like or dislike. I’m sure you’ve been on the receiving end of a client gift and compared the quality of items from various vendors or asked yourself, “Why did they think I would want this?”

If you want your client holiday gift “campaign” to reach its goals then you need to treat it like any other marketing initiative. Here are some tips for making your client holiday gifts deliver.

By Mark Cipolletti, Pinch Hit Partners Founder and Fractional CMO

It’s very difficult to get a new customer. And of course difficult translates to expensive. Research on this topic provides a wide range of figures on the costs associated with acquiring vs. retaining a customer, but most agree that it’s at least five times more costly to convince a new customer to buy than it is to get an existing customer to buy again.

So, why do so many businesses quickly forget about the customers they already have – the ones they’ve paid so dearly to acquire? Do they think that just because someone bought from them once that they will automatically buy again? I hope not. Other brands are constantly selling to our customers so we must continue to engage with them too. Maybe it’s because most agencies that support our companies are focused on customer acquisition. When was the last time you heard an agency tout their latest award for an email they created for existing customers? Uh…never.

Regardless of the reasons, the sad truth is that we often forget that most of our revenue comes from a small, but loyal, segment of our existing customers. Every marketing plan should include strategies for identifying our best customers and selling them more stuff.

​Here are some customer retention strategies to grow your business with the customers you already have:

By Mark Cipolletti, Pinch Hit Partners Founder and Fractional CMO

Over the last decade, the internet has fueled the growth of disruptors in every market segment. For many years, I worked in the travel industry where travel agents, tour operators and hoteliers saw their businesses forever changed by brands like Expedia, Travelocity, Jetsetter and Airbnb. Hailing a taxi cab has been replaced with Uber, Lyft and Safr. And buying a car has been transformed by the likes of TrueCar, Carvana and CarLotz. The list goes on.

Market disruption is a form of differentiation, a way for a brand to stand out amongst its competition. Disruptors understand that simply focusing on price or service just won’t cut it anymore. They use a multi-dimensional approach to differentiating their offerings to gain adoption from buyers and attention from the media and investors. Try taking a page from the disruptor’s playbook to breathe new life into your company’s brand.

​Here are four techniques to consider:

By Hillary Bressler, Travel and Hospitality Marketing Lead, Pinch Hit Partners

Stats are the lifeblood of good marketers. The funny thing is that many marketers got into marketing because they thought they had a lack of solid math skills in school and thus went the route of the non-math related careers in school.  This is a bad joke as we come to find out that the marketer’s entire career revolves around math.  Budgets, column inch, pixels, impressions, conversions, percentages and the good old statistic.

Marketers have come to have a love hate relationship with math, except that of the statistic. The statistic drives us and gives us ideas.  Marketers love statistics.

There are many statistics out there that are completely useless to marketers whose main goal is to increase sales or drive recognition of a brand.  For example, global mobile ad spending is expected to reach 247.4 billion U.S. dollars by 2020.  This stat is interesting to marketers, but it does not help us drive traffic to businesses or our clients. Yes, it tells us that the mobile industry is not going away, and we keep an eye on it to watch for major shifts, but it doesn’t fuel us.

I have compiled stats that fuel marketers and engage the thinking process.  Each one can spark an idea or help marketers convince key stakeholders to move budgets around to support this ever changing digital landscape. If these stats are not a wake-up call, I don’t know what is.

The times in digital marketing are changing….rapidly.

So fast I would consider many strategies, like mobile, to be considered an emergency. With mobile now representing 69% of digital media time spent (comScore​, 2017) the time to shift to mobile was yesterday.

In addition, 37% of all online spending in the United States and Europe is now made through Amazon. This figure is 57% for US consumers (Salmon 2017).

You may hate stats or love them, but you can’t leave them. Here are some of the most worthwhile:

Matt Smith, a direct-to-consumer marketing and branding leader, has joined Pinch Hit Partners as a fractional marketing consultant. Matt has over 20 years of experience leading marketing functions as a consultant for small companies and as an in-house executive for large corporations. As a Pinch Hit Partners consultant, he will serve small and mid-size companies as a fractional head of marketing, developing marketing strategy and overseeing marketing operations.

Most recently, Matt was the chief marketing officer for sweetFrog Enterprises with responsibility for marketing programs, brand management and business development. There, he helped grow the frozen yogurt franchiser into a 340 store, global segment leader.

​Matt’s career started in college sports marketing at the University of Richmond where he also helped run the media center for the 1992 Presidential Debate. Later he spent three years promoting the nation’s largest sports memorabilia conventions and coordinating appearances by professional athletes for Tuff Stuff Magazine.

In 2001, Matt was hired by Virginia Farm Bureau Insurance to start an in-house marketing department. Over the next 12 years his responsibilities grew to include strategic partnerships and change management. While at Farm Bureau, Matt negotiated the naming rights for Farm Bureau Live at Virginia Beach and helped lead the acquisition of the State Fair of Virginia and Meadow Farm.

Hazzard Electrical, a family-owned commercial electrical contractor headquartered in Ashland, Virginia, has chosen Pinch Hit Partners to develop a strategic marketing plan that will support the company’s future growth goals. For over 40 years, Hazzard has served central Virginia with quality electrical services and we are looking forward to helping develop a marketing plan that will power (pun intended) their company in 2018 and beyond.

Pinch Hitter Matt Smith will be the lead consultant on this project. Smith recently teamed up with Pinch Hit Partners after serving as the Chief Marketing Officer for SweetFrog Enterprises and Director of Marketing for Farm Bureau Insurance.

​Don’t start 2018 without a marketing plan for your business. Contact us today to discuss how Pinch Hit Partners can provide your company with big company marketing at a small company price.