As a kid my family had a small organic family farm (back in the 80s before it was cool to have one). Whenever my dad would find himself in a situation where he was temporarily unable to go about his day-to-day life of farming tasks because of lack of funds, lack of time or just plain bad weather he’d offer up this quip; “Can’t dance and it’s too wet to plow”.

It means circumstances aren’t good enough for you to relax, you need to do something, but what you really need to do you just can’t get to right now because something insurmountable is in your way.

That’s kind of where a lot of people find themselves these days with the economy.

Consumption and investment are way down and will be for some time. Marketers need customers to be able to engage in buying or you’re just wasting your time and money. You’re caught in a tough spot. Can’t dance sales needs leads and the leads are scarce and you can’t plow because there’s not many out there ready to buy. If you’re going to market, you need to make sure you’re targeting the right people with the right message at the right time.

So, what do you do?

My dad would sharpen tools, fix and tune equipment, organize the barn and cleaned things. As a kid, it seemed like aggravating busy work but what he was doing was honing his game plan. He’d also talk to me about new ideas and discuss new crop rotations and things he’d be meaning to get to. Some of our best ideas came out of unexpected breaks in the action because it took us out of the day to day grind.

I think some smart marketers are doing that now. The normal crush of the day-to-day chase for new business is temporarily lifted. If you take the time to evaluate what you’re doing and how you’re doing it so that when things heat up again (and they will!) you’ll be ready and able to take on more than ever before.

Need some ideas?

1. Reorganize your house list and get rid of bad data
2. Evaluate your customer’s experience with your company from your branding to how you answer the phone
3. Investigate new technology that can help you reach them more efficiently or in different ways
4. Automate tasks that are manual now to free up human resources to pursue more creative goals.. the time you save may be your own!
5. Go walk in another person’s shoes. Spend time with customer service, sales, or shipping. Find out what they see and think
6. Better yet, go spend a day with your customer or at least take them to lunch (brown bag it if expense accounts are tight) on the idea of making their lives a little better
7. Clean out your desk, get rid of any useless ‘bulk’ such as old and tired trade rags, paper you’ll never touch again and don’t need
8. Call 2 people outside your company you haven’t talked to in a while, every day, and see what they are doing during these times. You might get inspired or inspire them.
9. Go to an after hour networking event. Be amazed at how many really great qualified people are jobless. Then feel good about the fact that you still have a job. And if you’re jobless, feel good that 99% of the jobless people are home watching TV and you’re out there getting ready for your comeback

We’re seeing a pretty big surge in our business here at L2 because of the people who are taking this opportunity to rebuild are finally able to bring us into their marketing mix. It’s actually a good time for L2! However; we see the troubled waters out there and are eager for things to get better soon.

So until you can start plowing again, sharpen your tools and think about how you’re going to get to the dance!

I would love to hear comments about how people are using the economic downturn to rebuild, retool and reinvent themselves.

Uncertain times? Definitely, but its not all depressing.

Bradley Johnson and Kevin Brown, in their introduction to Ad Age’s annual 2009, looks at how marketers still launch new products, campaigns, and tweak marketing messages even in major recessions.

Here are some strategies marketers could adopt in this down time.

1) Targeted rather than mass marketing.

Most have already made the leap towards sending marketing messages that are relevant and customized to each individual, but those that haven’t/ refuse to will likely lose out in 2009.

Targeted messaging creating campaigns that are relevant to each segment and each individual in your datalist. Customizing everything from messaging to the offer and design.

2) Build marketing applications.

Applications add variety to your marketing message and can help brands build better relationships with their customers. They can be as simple as Facebook applications, interactive games or content aggregators that work through viral marketing.

Read: Applications- The next wave of marketing.

2009 will be a year where marketing has to find more innovative and cost-efficient ways to connect with the customer. Competing on price may not be sufficient in the fledgling economy.

3) Quality in direct mail not quantity

Suzanne Obermire, reports news of a postal slump for the USPS in volume and revenue. Sending direct-mail isn’t cheap and with decreasing marketing budgets, they have to be used more effectively with other mediums through interactive campaigns.

4) Measuring effectiveness of marketing

One of Seth Godin’s first 2009 blog posts has to do with ensuring ads work. No longer can marketers run ads they don’t measure or track. The same level of analytics that we associate with adwords campaigns, will be necessary to measure response from email, web, print and direct mail campaigns.