The Technology Sector Is Struggling According To Survey Results

A survey carried out recently by a leading sales and marketing coach showed some shocking and in some cases rather concerning results about the 2009 marketing plans for small technology businesses in the UK.

The Technology Sales and Marketing Survey for 2009 has discovered that small, owner-managed technology companies in England and Wales are not doing all they can to help reverse their fortunes in this challenging economic climate.

Companies from across the technology sector were asked 5 questions designed to profile the impact of the recession on their businesses and how they will be marketing themselves in the year ahead, the results showed that all respondents expected a downturn in revenues and that 98% were seeking new customers ” with the majority of those stating that they expected up to 25% of sales to come from this source.

It appears to be the web service providers who are suffering the most in these harsh times as these are the ones who have cut the most staff and have cut most money from their marketing plans. This demonstrates short sightedness on their part as it has been shown from the last time the country was in recession that the companies that keep up effective marketing campaigns will be at the top of the pile when the economy stabilises itself.

It was also fairly concerning to learn that these small businesses were far too reliant on the personal approach, quoting referrals as their most frequent method of attracting new business ” and shying away from web and electronic forms of marketing.

Ironically, it seems that it is these technology companies that are not making the most of the Internet. Yet this is a simple fix and e-marketing programmes can be initiated very quickly. Im not advocating that personal contacts should be abandoned but companies cannot afford to ignore the other marketing options open to them ” especially in these difficult times.

So the main finding from this survey was that a lot of these technology companies are drastically cutting their spend on marketing, even though we can see from past recessions that the companies who carry on marketing themselves will some out on top in the future.