During down economic times, many companies face tough decisions. Sales are down, price-cutting is prevalent, staff is being reduced and lack of revenue is killing them. These are extremely difficult realities to deal with and even harder for companies to figure out the best way to navigate these stormy waters.

Unfortunately, marketing (and in turn advertising) is usually one of the first places that companies look to help save the bottom line. Seems to makes sense. It is an expense that they can save now. If the company goes dark for a while they should be okay, customers will still be there later. Then when times get better they’ll reinstate the marketing budget.

I am not insensitive to the challenges facing companies today. I understand the hard financial decisions that need to happen during down markets. I’ve lived through a few. And each company is different, their business model is different and their objectives are different, so my thoughts may not apply to all. But in my most simplistic viewpoint – if revenues are down, wouldn’t you want to support the area that should help generate business for your company?

Here’s some food for thought from an article on MacTech.com:

“In a study of U.S. recessions, McGraw-Hill Research analyzed 600 companies covering 16 different SIC industries from 1980 through 1985. The results showed that business-to-business firms that maintained or increased their advertising expenditures during the 1981-1982 recession averaged significantly higher sales growth, both during the recession and for the following three years, than those that eliminated or decreased advertising. By 1985, sales of companies that were aggressive recession advertisers had risen 256% over those that didn’t keep up their advertising. Sales for the companies studied were relatively even before the recession, but varied sharply during and after it. Companies that cut advertising during both of the recessionary years maintained flat sales during the period and only modest sales growth in the following two years. In contrast, the companies that maintained their advertising experienced significant sales growth throughout the four-year period.

“A series of six studies conducted by the research firm of Meldrum & Fewsmith showed conclusively that advertising aggressively during recessions not only increases sales but increases profits. This fact has held true for all post-World War II recessions studied by American Business Press starting in 1949.”

You can read the entire article here.

Based on the research, there are tangible reasons for turning it up in a down market. And yes, tough times call for tough decisions, so there are no easy answers. And marketing isn’t necessarily the silver bullet that will make everything all right for every company. But marketing can be an integral investment (not an expense) that can help sustain the organization through tough times now and reap greater rewards in the future.

So how good is HBO’s marketing campaign for its upcoming vampire drama “True Blood?”  So good that my father called me this week wondering if I had heard the news that vampires were living among us.

Seriously. He really did. The conversation went something like this: Dad: “Hey.”  Me: “Hey.”  Dad: “They just had on the news that vampires came out of hiding because a Chinese manufacturer developed a synthetic blood they can drink instead of human blood.”  Me:  “Wow.”  Dad: “I know!”  Me: “No I mean I seriously think I need to call the institution immediately.”  Dad:  “It was on the news!”  Me:  “What channel?”  Dad:  “HBO.”  Me: “HBO. Are you sure it wasn’t a marketing campaign?”  Dad: “They do documentaries all the time.”

Now, I admit to having prior knowledge of this campaign before my father’s panicked call. The Internet has been abuzz with various secrets, web sites and videos related to “True Blood” so I wasn’t worried about the vampire infestation as much as I was worried about my father’s health. I don’t know if I’m going to watch the show or not, but one thing I do know is that the cleverness of the campaign surpasses even “The Dark Knight” standards.

The reason?  Because instead of just focusing on a single audience or demographic, the marketing materials and messages reached across demographic boundaries, interesting everyone from nutcases who consider themselves vampires to nutcases who are convinced vampires live among us.

It’s a key component we often forget as marketers and one of the main elements of word of mouth marketing.  If you have a good or interesting product you likely already have a core group of supporters.  The key to sustained success is identifying additional groups and figuring out clever and strategic ways to reach them too.  It’s something Emanuel Rosen refers to as “The Busy Network Paradox” in his book The Anatomy of Buzz.  Too often we become obsessed with those close to us, consumed with “supporting our supporters” as Rosen puts it.  We neglect outside networks and their influence on our product or service and we eventually take our supporters for granted, letting information become stale.

My dad couldn’t care less about searching an online dating site for vampires, but a hard-hitting news piece and he’s over-the-moon nuts.  This campaign combined offline scavenger hunts, buzzworthy mailers to targeted individuals, synthetic blood drink displays and much more to interest large audience segments across the board. Kudos to HBO for engaging varied audiences and further confusing my father.  They’ve added to my daily frustration, but gotten themselves new viewers in the process.