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Weekly Wrap

Weekly Wrap – Mark Mason, Mubaloo

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By The Drum Team, Editorial

February 26, 2009 | 2 min read

Mark Mason,CEO – Mubaloo hosts this week's Wrap

In this type of climate clients don’t want to give bad news as much as agencies don’t want to hear it. So imagine those clients and jobs won’t come in and cut accordingly. But when you cut, do it decisively; cut deep and once. This tells the surviving part of the agency that you know what you’re doing and stops them worrying about losing their own jobs. I cut an agency from 48 people to 13 in 2001.

It was an awful experience at the time but the agency eventually started to grow again and more importantly the agency brand survived intact. The second reason we survived is because we looked after our cash. Cash is king in a recession so protect it. Pull in money owed to you. Push out money going out. This recession has highlighted the fact that many companies have not planned for a potential recession, let alone a rainy day. My rule of thumb is to have at least three months cash in the bank.

OK, it won’t make any money in the bank but it will help you survive. The last piece of advice I can give is to practice what we preach, market yourself through the recession. It has been shown again and again that companies who do this come out of a recession far stronger and with greater market share. It stand to reason as your competitors probably won’t be. It will also enable you to pull yourself out of the recession faster than anyone else.

Mark Mason (Ex-CEO of Mason Zimbler)

CEO

Mubaloo

Weekly Wrap

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