Currently, we are facing recession. Recession always changes things for everyone, and we are often left wondering what we can do to maintain our businesses.
The Bank of England recently warned that this could be the longest recession since records began; the bank forecasts that this could go well into 2024. None of this is good news.
I remember when I was a child, my mother telling me that chocolate sales always went up during hard times such as a recession. I asked her why and she said that people who were struggling needed a little bit of something nice to make themselves feel better. It kind of made sense, but why would they need it? The answer boils down to it being required for their mental wellbeing; the key word here being “required”.
I appreciate that we don’t sell chocolate, but we do sell things that are required. We provide the vital tools needed to do business these days. The producers and sellers of equipment may well see a downturn as their clients push the inevitable refresh a year or two further away, so as to save on capital outlay. However, those of us that provide services, especially those paid for on a monthly basis, should not see the same reduction in trade. These services are not optional, they cannot be pushed back in the same way that capital purchases can be.
In short, those selling services should not feel the same rate of economic decline as other parts of the economy. That’s all fine, but what about growing your business, selling more of something during a recession? Going back to our chocolate analogy: we need to sell things that are required to the degree that any organisation aware enough to survive will know that it needs. For this we look to cyber security.
It's no surprise but the recession is not the only event happening in the world at the moment. The groups that make money from hacking, ransomware, etc. seem to get to a certain size and split up, forming more groups doing the same thing. Think of it as a cancer metastasising: growing and spreading until it kills the host. Only we can stand in the way and protect our clients from becoming victims.
The methods of attack develop continuously to try to counter the targets’ defences. This is an arms race, and we sell the weapons needed to defend against the protagonists. It may seem cynical to take this point of view, but we are not profiteering, we are simply providing a required service at a fair price. Without us, our clients would stand little chance.
In conclusion, if you want to survive in this recession then sell services, preferably on a monthly basis so as to make them easily affordable. If you want to do more than survive then ensure that you are providing a complete stack of cyber-security services. After all, selling weapons in an arms race is always profitable!
