Every Dot Connects

Backing off of PR and marketing during an economic downturn is a natural reaction to bad news, but shutting down too far may not be your wisest business move.

There are still customers out there who will buy quality products and services, but they have to know about them first.  Since money is tight, companies should be thinking about using methods that provide the best value, to ensure they continue to engage with customers and keep their brand visible.

The video below is a hallway interview from PRNewser with two guys who have built semi-empires out of “nothing” but their own drive, talent and Web-based tools and communities — wine enthusiast Gary Vaynerchuk and provocative online video maker and puppeteer Loren Feldman.

Gary Vaynerchuk says that, “In a down economy, the social media play has big ROI numbers.”  He doesn’t quantify other than to say it’s worked well for his wine retail business (and we’re the last ones who want to play drinking games with the social media Kool-Aid) but the fact is that this is where the action is, and if you aren’t at least poking around a little trying to figure it out, you’re late.

Vaynerchuk and Feldman’s methods are certainly not appropriate for every (or even many) companies, but ANY company should take note of how they’ve done what they’ve done online, at very little cost but with a ton of work.

I want to emphasize….social media may be cheap, but it ain’t easy.  Still, as Vaynerchuk says at the end of the video, that “standard” $50,000 ad buy in the dead-tree Esquire may not cut the mustard in this economy.

For our RSS and email subscribers who cannot see the embedded video box, here is the URL to click to see it.