Surviving the holidays

If you watch or read the news or generally have see any business news at all, you will see that the economic outlook for the holidays as we know them is not so good (particularly in the D). How will your business fare in this environment? I've got three ideas that will help you answer that question positively:

• CRM - Yep, those three magic little letters that are often hard to define. For the purposes of this holiday season (and beyond), I'd think of CRM as a tool for holding on to your current customers. To me, this seems of key importance right now. Doesn't now seem like a great time to launch a loyalty program? What about website revisions that make it more interactive? What about becoming more connected via facebook, myspace, or other web 2.0 sites? Do you currently have a system for customer feedback? Basically, the goal is a two way conversation that allows current customers to interact and feel like they are a part of your success.
  
• New Incentives - why do you have loyal customers now? (If you don't know, see Research below.) How can you tap into their loyalty to spread the word? Maybe a "bring a friend" incentive. Perhaps its time to do some impromtu sweepstakes, party, or other creative event to bring in new traffic. What companies are around you? What about a special incentive for their employees or a new supplier and family discount?
  
• Research - it may seem counterintuitive to be spending money on something right now that may not have a direct ROI calculation. These items are often the first to cut. However, I would argue that now is the PERFECT time for this. You have to better understand what consumers are willing to spend money on, why they spend their money with you vs. competitors, and what they "can't" live without. This doesn't have to be complicated. You could offer a gift certificate to get folks to come into the shop and sit down with you to talk. You could set up a short online survey using one of the many online survey tools (I personally like surveymonkey.com) or set up a new topic for improvements on your forum. I see this as an excellent the start to a conversation with your customers (see CRM above).

Any of these will give you something positive to present to customers, employees, and investors, rather than just the doom and gloom that all of them are getting anyway.