1. Age

Plummeting asset values disproportionally affected the 50-plus since they own 80% of the nation’s wealth. For the young, with their high debt levels and ambitions for home ownership, the sight of declining property values and interest rates has been fantastic news.

2. Employment

Those in secure employment have benefited from the continuous stream of high street ‘sales’ that have been going on since before Christmas. However, new entrants to the job markets and those having lost their jobs have seen their standard of living plummet with little prospect of it recovering.

3. Savers or borrowers

Historically low interest rates have provided a bonanza for those with tracker mortgages while those on fixed rates look on in envy. Savers have seen their income from savings all but disappear.

4. Type of employer

Salary freezes and employment cuts create hardship for those in the private sector while government employees have benefited from job security and salary rises.

5. Geography

Swindon’s consumers have seen the price of their properties decline at record levels and unemployment increase by 200%. Their peers in Northern Ireland have fared better than any region of the UK.

What this means for marketers

The record low level of the consumer confidence index masks the fact that the recession has created winners as well as losers. So what do marketers need to do if they are to exploit the recession’s winners?

Rethink market segment definitions and priorities

The lead article in the April edition of the Harvard Business Review, titled 'How to market in a downturn', concludes that: 'The market segmentation scheme you used to plan your marketing budget and programmes, this time last year, is now obsolete.' Your segmentation strategy must adapt to reflect the new market reality.

Understand that the recession is like a virus – it mutates and spreads

For the past 18 months we have evolved from the ‘credit crunch’ into a ‘high street recession’. The next phase is the ‘residual damage’ created by the Government’s attempt to extricate us from the first two phases. This will affect consumer demand for decades, not years. The profile of the winners and losers is not fixed. Smart marketers will monitor these changes and adapt.

Make their advertising sympathetic to the national moods

Those consumers who are not suffering the recession’s effects are still susceptible to the ebbs and flows of the nation’s mood. Strangely, the advertising industry has been slow to react and exploit these emotions.

Conspicuous consumption is uncool
The consumer demand for luxury goods has been remarkably buoyant. But, consumers appear embarrassed by their ability and desire to buy such goods.  

Uncertainty about the future
Of all the consumer indexes it is the expectations of the future that continue at record lows. I might be okay today but what about tomorrow?

Anger
The Kübler-Ross model of grieving has found a new use in explaining consumers’ reaction to their economic ills. Most people are in the ‘anger’ phase and looking for people to blame. The vitriol aimed at the banks is now being broadening to include all 'big business'.

Shared experience
The media’s coverage of the recession has gone on longer and been more intense than almost any other event in the last decade. The recession has dominated everybody’s lives from the unemployed graduate to the former member of the 'Rich List'.

Feeling trapped
Those who are prospering realise that their options for change have diminished or vanished. Materially many people are doing fine but the pre-recession world of infinite opportunities has gone.

Assuming these feelings have become part of the national psyche it is interesting to observe how companies have reacted.

It was a bad idea for Aviva/Norwich Union to spend an estimated £37m on a high profile re-branding exercise.

Innocent shouldn't have sold Coca-Cola a minority stake worth £30m.

Hovis was right to resurrect and build upon its nostalgic 'Boy on the bike' ad.

RBS’s decision to cut its sports sponsorship spend by 50% was a good call.

It was a wise move for the trusted brands of Tesco and Boots to signal their intentions to move into branch banking.

BMI's tongue-in-cheek campaign justifying the value of business class travel even during a recession was spot on.

Dick Stroud is author of  The 50-Plus Market and managing director of marketing consultancy, 20plus30consulting.