While we hope your marketing team is enjoying some deserved vacation time this summer, your actual marketing might want to think twice before kicking back with a fruity umbrella drink.

Here are five reasons why summer is never the right time to cool down your channel marketing activities:

1. It’s Easier to Build on Momentum

Ask any sports hero, any successful book author, or any musician that’s successfully produced a series of hit albums — there’s something to this momentum thing. Resting after a big success should be kept brief, because that momentum built on a big win dies quickly, and it’s hard to revive. If your channel marketing blasted through the holidays and spring, taking off for the summer will mean you have to regroup, reinvent, refocus, and breathe new life into your campaigns this fall. It’s much easier to keep the momentum going and in top shape when it’s time to buckle down for the fall.

2. This Always-On Society Never Closes for Business

Even if your business is seasonal, shopping has now bled across the entire calendar. It’s easy to see. Retail stores roll out the next season’s merchandise the moment a current season ends. Social media means people are passively shopping even when they aren’t thinking about buying. Marketing is the same way. In order to be successful, you have to keep your messages in front of your audience year-round. For example, if you’ve seen an ad for your absolute favorite product every day for the past three months when it comes time to buy you’ll be much more likely to invest your money with them than with a business that you haven’t seen hide nor hair of since the last buying cycle. Be the constant in an ever-changing world, and cater to your shoppers, who are always on, even when they aren’t actively seeking your products.

3. Your Brand Reputation Has a Shelf Life

Building a brand reputation is a marathon, not a sprint. This is true no matter how long your buying cycle is. It takes a long time and a lot of careful effort to establish and position your brand name. As soon as those efforts halt, the reputation begins to fade. Buyers live in a world that’s always changing. There are always new products and services demanding their attention. If your marketing department isn’t an ever-constant, it will be all too easy for customers to lose focus and begin eyeing a competitor.

4. Customer Profiles Aren’t Static

Customer profiles are a moving target. You develop new markets for your products, markets change, and new competitors roll on the scene as older ones bow out. If your marketing takes off for the summer, your customer profile could shift considerably — and this is especially true in an election year when the world economy is in a fragile state. If you want to stay on top of an ever shifting customer profile, it’s important to be collecting metrics, analyzing tactics, and revising strategies all summer long.

5. Generating More Leads Allows Your Business to be Choosy About Its Customers

Is there such a thing as too many customers? When your marketing is able to keep them coming, your business can actually be picky and choosy about which customers you do business with. Building a waiting list for your products and services is your insurance policy for when customers are harder to come by. Marketers should take notes from the squirrels, which spend their summers stocking up for winter. This is what keeps your business afloat in slower seasons or tougher economic conditions. Take a lesson from Game of Thrones: Winter is Coming.

Keep up your channel marketing efforts all summer long, and come fall, your company will be in the best position to capitalize on those efforts.