Yes, you can cut your advertising budget in tough times

Now, I am not for a minute saying that those who encourage clients not to cut back on their spend are wrong. The thing is that unless you are far more efficient than is the norm in South Africa, you can easily cut back your spend in tough times.

Quite simply, the results of marketing audits I have done over the years show that roughly 30 percent of all marketing and advertising spend in this country is completely and utterly wasted.

So it seems to me, that the average South African company can happily cut back on its ad and marketing budgets by a third.

But, and that’s a big BUT, you have to be careful about which 30 percent you cut.

If you cut that 30 percent that is completely wasted and just leave the 70 percent that is working, you will have saved a ton of money without affecting your marketing performance on advertising return on investment.

The first step in all this, of course, is to conduct a fairly simple and straightforward marketing audit to identify the deadwood in your budget.

It really isn’t rocket science.