When the levee breaks

A volatile day on the stock market.

Things are looking good for the PR and indeed marketing industry in the North West and I am sure across the country.

If you have a look at How Do for instance it never seems to be short of major account wins.

In the 90s I was working in IT and the golden days were predicted by some to be never ending. One managing director of an Internet agency predicted in a trade magazine that it would be, to paraphrase, "stupid" to even ask if the Internet industry could encounter a downturn. That was about a month before the dotcom crash.

PR in Manchester is highly competitive and new agencies and new expansion plans seem to gather pace.

But what if we have another downturn?

PR and marketing budgets will be slashed and the predictable marketing strategy of if we can demonstrate a return then we will keep it. Hence, direct marketing and call centres become a little more popular. It is not what good marketing and PR is about: relationships and not "mud against the wall and something will stick" approach.

Interest rates are up , borrowing is high, the US has had a property crash - is tomorrow another sunny day?

If we do have a downturn in 2008 or 2009, who will survive? Will it be good for the industry to have a correction?

I do not have the answers but my experience of the dotcom crash tells me never take for granted a comfortable set of economic statistics.