Economic Woes
There's no denying that today's uncertain economic climate is having an impact on marketing budgets around the globe. While we have yet to hear of any major changes as of late, it is clear that the landscape is changing. Smaller companies are scaling back what used to be a $10k minimum and medium to larger sized companies are reducing their fees as they are seen as a cost center. What remains clear is that during these times, PR is still a critical component of the marketing plan and in the case of financial services organizations, crisis communications is coming to the forefront of their programs. In many cases, companies are looking to outside contractors and freelancers to fill the gaps where requests for new hires or backfill for recent openings are being denied. So far, we have yet to see any major impacts, but larger agencies have reported an estimated 2% reductions in their client spending for 2009.