Cambridge Online survey reveals 42% of creative businesses grew sales strongly through the recession
Creative businesses fared better than average through faster diversification and quicker response to changing customer needs
Cambridge Online, a leading IT systems and services provider, has published results from its first annual East of England Regional Business Survey to show how media and creative businesses located across the nine Eastern region counties fared during the recession.
42% of creative businesses surveyed grew their sales by at least 10% during the peak of the recession in 2009/10, compared to 29% for all respondents. Creative businesses reduced the impact of the recession through engaging with customers more (57%) and were more adept at diversifying into new products and services or targeting new geographic markets, with 50% of creative businesses diversifying compared to 33% for the survey overall.
29% of creative businesses reduced staff levels by more than 10% - the same as the regional average. But none of the creative businesses surveyed were looking to make new job cuts whereas 9% of all businesses across the region were planning job cuts. 59% of businesses across the region improved systems and processes to find efficiencies and this was the main activity for them to reduce the impact of the downturn. If they had to face the downturn again 64% of creative businesses would have innovated more to build new products, services and income streams compared to 29% across all Eastern region businesses surveyed.
Creative businesses are split with regards to the Eastern region with (50%) agreeing the East of England is ideal for accessing skilled employees needed to grow their businesses and 50% disagreeing. Only 14% of creative businesses believe that the new local enterprise partnerships (LEPs) which are set to replace East of England Development Agency (EEDA) will be more effective, compared to 50% of the region’s businesses overall.
Creative businesses rated increased price sensitivity of clients and prospects as the biggest barrier to growth in the next 12 months. Attracting new customers is the top business priority for 50% of creative businesses over the period.
IT budgets were set to decrease for 29% of creative businesses compared to an average of 15% overall. While just 21% are increasing their IT budgets, less than the 35% regional average. Creative businesses consider social media to be at the top of their ‘most interesting IT development’, compared to the majority of businesses placing social media towards the bottom of their list.
Half (50%) of creative businesses surveyed did not have a customer relationship management (CRM) system in place, and none of the businesses used paper based customer records compared to 18% on average. Maximising sales opportunities, managing customer and prospect databases, plus analysing trends in customer buying behaviour were the main uses for a new CRM system.
43% of creative businesses did not measure return on investment (ROI) for their IT projects, though 29% looked for ROI within a year, compared to 12% for businesses across the region.
Ray Olds, chief executive officer, Cambridge Online, commented:
“Creative businesses were naturally able to innovate quicker than most businesses and diversify into new product and service areas. It is interesting to see that they did not refresh their systems and processes to find additional efficiencies, and maybe this is an area for further investigation. Systems such as CRM will play a vital role for creative businesses as they try to read their customers better, thereby maximising all sales opportunities and minimising the impact of price pressures.”
Creative businesses taking part in the survey ranged from magazine, newspaper and book publishers through to design, marketing and advertising agencies.
To download an executive summary of the results, please visit http://www.cambridgeonline.net/docs/Survey_executive_summary.pdf
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