The Survey of Proactive Marketing Strategies Impacts on Business Performance during Recession; Study of Active Iranian Companies in Abbasabad Industrial Park

Abstract

The performance of businesses and organizations and even their survival can be severely affected by recessions. However, all firms are not equally affected by a recession. In fact, some firms even experience better conditions in markets during recessions. Past studies and investigations about marketing in economic turbulent times and especially in proactive marketing suggest that some firms view a recession as an opportunity and develop an aggressive marketing reaction, while others cut back, waiting for the recession to pass. We use the term proactive marketing, to represent the strategic reaction of companies to a recession, or more generally, to a turbulent environment. We show that proactive marketing is an important factor for a company to view and react to recessions. Specifically, we develop and test a model of the antecedents and consequences of proactive marketing during a recession. The results of a survey of 45 senior marketing executives in Abbasabad Industrial Park in Iran reveal that some companies do accept and execute proactive marketing during recessions. Our results indicate that if companies have a strategic emphasis on marketing, embody an entrepreneurial culture, possess slack resources, they will more likely to have a proactive marketing reaction during turbulent times especially recessions. Also, results show that proactive marketing plays a significant role in improving both market and business performance during the recession. The implications of our results can be discussed for both marketing theory and managerial practice.