Fighting Recession - American Hairlines

Many thanks to Scott Purcell of the R2 Group in Oregon for his comment on my post titled “Driving In Your Sleep”. Building on Scott’s comment it’s hard not to observe that wherever you turn these days all you seem to hear about are the recession, hard times, job cuts, repossessions, TARP, bailouts and everyone seems to blame everything on the economy. Well let me put a different spin on things:-

I feel that too many of us see recession exclusively as something that is bad for us and fail to see it as something that can be turned into an opportunity. When recessions bite, we need to remember that it hits the competition just as hard as it hits you and therefore you have a great opportunity to attack your competitor’s customer base and squeeze them even harder by being truly customer focused.

Customer focused organizations will always do better in a recession than product focused companies because they are seen by the customer to be offering solutions rather than simply being additional expenditure. The product focused outfit therefore is the one most likely to suffer as a result of the customer's budget cuts. Ask questions of your customers and listen to their answers. By truly understanding what their needs are and proving that you can provide a value for money solution you will differentiate yourself from those who TELL the customer what they need and then bombard them with offers. The only recession that has me worried right now is my fast receding hairline. What's your opinion? Please make your comment below.