Five Ways to Keep Customers Buying More Despite a Recession

Down, but not out.

That's how you should think of today's economy. True, people are spending less, but they're still spending. People and companies are simply choosier about where and how to spend so they can get through the down times strongly and safely. By understanding and catering to customer psychology in the following five ways, you can ensure coming out of the downturn a winner.

1. Pursue a more receptive, ready-to-buy audience. This might mean targeting more upscale prospects than you have been, reexamining the zip codes to which you mail promotions or going after clients in industries less affected by the economic downturn, such as IT, energy, education and health care. For your company, the relevant indicator might be the availability of time rather than money. For example, when the economy slows down, people might have more time for scrapbooking projects, do-it-yourself home improvement or finishing a book manuscript.

2. Look for leverage. If you work with a group rather than individuals, you can earn more in the same amount of time even while each customer pays less. An ingenious implementation of this is a program called "Fitness by Phone" in which personal trainers keep clients motivated for their workouts by telephone rather than in person. Note also that neither the trainers nor the clients have to travel to work together this way - a relevant factor when gas prices are high.

3. Follow up automatically. Autoresponder technology from companies like Aweber.com, Getresponse.com and some shopping carts enables you to create a sequence of timed messages that gets triggered by a request, purchase or signup. Put this sequence in place once, and it tirelessly continues educating or selling for you from then on. Some shrewd entrepreneur is soon going to enable the same kind of automatic triggering for postcards and other mailed pieces. In the meantime, postcard and lettershop vendors like PostcardBuilder.com let you design a piece online, then upload your database for sending on a specific date. Be smart and get followup systems working for you now.

4. Collect testimonials. Here's something else to take care of if you're not already doing it: Tell service clients and those who've purchased your products that you're looking for success stories. How have they benefited from your offerings? Ask permission to use a concise, juicy version of their comments on postcards, on your web site and in sales presentations. If you've been collecting written testimonials, maybe it's time to step up to audio and video ones. Testimonials that describe specific results help persuade on-the-fence prospects.

5. Become timely. Refer to the current situation in your marketing. Explicitly relate your expertise and what you do day after day to what's most on people's minds. Let's say you run a day care center. These days, you provide a refuge for children from their parents' worries. Or you sell home heating fuel. Explain how you're working hard to help families keep their homes warm this winter.

Creativity, resourcefulness and a can-do attitude pull you ahead of all the gloom-and-doomers. Make a deliberate effort to hang around with optimists. Then get to work!