Are You a Victim or Are You Responsible?

a guest post by Joy Gendusa

(www.bizchicksrule.com) — I caught a segment on The Morning Show with Mike & Juliet recently about a young single mother working 30 hours a week for $7/hr. She’s only bringing home a mere $180 per week after taxes! The show really poured it on about the state of the economy and the difficulties people are facing. It’s not that I’m heartless — I mean, I too worked for a very low wage not too many years ago when my kids were babies. I too had to figure out who to pay first and who I could stave off for another week. But it really got me thinking about the idea of allowing oneself to be a "victim" of the economy. It made me wonder what kind of employee this young woman was. Why can she only command $7/hr? We all understand how difficult it can be to find competent help. What is her responsibility in her scenario?

The word "change" is the big buzz word in the news with both candidates. But instead of waiting for change there are definitely things you can do in your business right now to bring about change.

The girl on the show was clearly defeated. She wants and expects someone else to fix her life for her. We’re hearing from our prospects and our customers that they need to pinch pennies and that things are tough financially these days.

Traditionally many business owners cut out marketing to save money. Look at Bennigan’s. When was the last time you saw any kind of ad or promotion for that restaurant? I honestly can’t remember. They killed themselves that way and left thousands jobless. They didn’t change when they needed to.

Something immediately jumps out at me: The actions you took that won you your income in the past are no longer effective or effective enough today. Well, you have to CHANGE something.

Does this ring true? I know it is true for me at my company, PostcardMania. We’ve had to continuously test new ideas and pump up the amount of communication we are putting out in order to maintain our current size. This is not so easy to swallow but swallow it we must. I mean, if we don’t what is our other option? Lay people off? Cut our healthcare benefit? For me these are not options. So we take a deep breath, put our noses to the grindstone, put in a few extra hours, and ACT.

What do you have to change in order to grow? Ask yourself, “How many leads do I need now in order to close the same amount of business I was closing a year ago?”

Many business owners during boon times rely solely on word of mouth. Now they are shrinking because they refuse to advertise or market. Some businesses only ever send out a quarterly mailing to stay in touch with past clients. Now those clients are price shopping and that quarterly mailing is no longer enough.

I have always marketed more than most and therefore I’ve seen crazy unprecedented growth over the last 10 years for my company. I say "unprecedented" not because others haven’t also grown, but we did it organically — not taking any investment capital ever. But, alas, even what we had been doing – the actions that caused that growth — is no longer enough. So, I’m learning again. I’m rolling up my sleeves and figuring out WHAT IS ENOUGH.

Even though this message applies to all business owners far and wide, my message is for businesswomen especially. As women, we should have the foresight to see what the greatest good is for all concerned and take those actions that are going to get us, our customers, our employees, our families and loved ones ahead. In this current economic environment we need to be strong and apply the necessary effort to ensure that our businesses expand.

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Using a powerful, simple, extremely cost-effective way of communicating with customers has earned Joy Gendusa Inc Magazine’s recognition as the nation’s fastest growing direct mail postcard-marketing firm with year 2007 revenues at nearly $19,000,000. Gendusa began in 1998 with zero investment capital. Today, her Clearwater, FL, firm, PostcardMania employs over 160 people and prints 4 million and mails 2 million postcards representing more than 31,000 customers in over 350 industries each week.

Note: A version of this article originally appeared in Joy’s newsletter, and she rewrote it for the Biz Chicks Rule audience.

(image: SXC.hu)

Tags: womens business blog, women, woman, business, joy gendusa, postcard mania, direct mail marketing, economy, change, growth, marketing, responsibility, accountability, recession, biz chicks rule, kristen king