The outbreak of COVID-19 is having a tremendous impact on countries, communities, and businesses worldwide. With no cure in sight at present, social distancing seems to be the only way to limit the spread of the virus. While people around the world are ‘social distancing’ and working remotely, buying and consumption patterns have also changed drastically. Many businesses and industries have been threatened and are close to the brink of a collapse. These changes are impacting all of us, directly or indirectly in many ways.
In response to the travel bans, school closures, and recommendations to not gather in large groups and keep our distance from fellow humans, many of us have turned to digital tools for some semblance of normality. Be it in terms of virtual classes for school students, ‘Work from Home’ and ‘Teams’ meetings for corporate employees, online shopping for essential goods or just information consumption, there has been a paradigm shift in the consumer behaviour in the last few months- all around the world.
Here are a few statistics that can help us, marketers, to go back to the drawing board and strategize for the coming months.
· 9 in 10 consumers have changed their traditional shopping habits
· More than 50% of consumers have ordered products online that they would normally purchase at the store
· Nearly 6 in 10 consumers say they are worried about going to the store due to fear of being infected by the virus
· The time spent on smartphones per user has gone up by 6.2 percent
· While 15-24 years and 25-34 years age group users have increased their screen time by 7% and 3%, it’s the 35-44 years age group, who now spend 11% more time on their mobile screens
· News apps also witnessed 8% more users per week spent on an average of 32 minutes reading news
· Almost all social networking apps – Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok have seen significant increases (50 times more) not only in time spent but also in the sessions per user
· Slack, Zoom and Microsoft Teams have seen a significant increase in usage post covid19 outbreak
So, we have officially entered a new age of an isolated economy. Governments and organizations will take aggressive steps to revive the economy globally, marketing will go through a drastic change, organizations will have to decrease their marketing spend, and there will be a lot of emphasis on safety and the role of organizations to prioritize humanity over any brand. So, if you are the head of a marketing organization or a brand, you will need to push the reset button.
These are my 5 pointers that can help you re-prioritize your marketing strategies post COVID-19
1. Anticipate the needs of your consumer
Your consumer needs and behavior have changed drastically – money, jobs, safety, social distancing, stress, anxiety, loneliness, increased consciousness and a new set of consumption priorities.
Identifying and understanding these emerging patterns and creating meaningful engagements accordingly, will be the go-to thing to do! Helping consumers solve their day-to-day problems and adding a tone of empathy, positivity and humanity will become a key-differentiator for brands to lead the way.
A great example here is Amazon’s ‘Audible’ offering free streaming of educational content so ‘working from home’ parents can keep their children engaged and learning while schools remain shut.
2. Create Content that matters
Your marketing budgets, strategies and initiatives will have to change. Content will play a key role, given narratives and tones will see a drastic change. While the content@scale approach is preferred for cost efficiencies, it may lose meaning if not implemented effectively given a large set of a distracted and information-loaded audience.
Insight and data driven content, executed creatively with co-creation between brands and agencies delivered in an agile and scalable manner will be the way ahead! Content direction will take the route of navigating the virtual world, DIY and the like, and SEO strengthening will gain importance to reach, educate and entertain your consumers well. A word of caution here will be to avoid the pressure of ‘out of sight is out of mind’ which leads to content that does not add value to either – consumer, society or brand purpose!
A good example here is Nike continuously engaging with its consumers despite closed stores – free subscription on its Training App streaming workouts and fitness tips, workout ideas through Nike and Nike Running Club apps, Nike.com Podcasts and Social media and its new marketing campaign ‘Play for the World’ highlighting how athlete endorsers are keeping in good form through the pandemic.
3. Go digital, re-prioritize and add value
If you hadn’t already, now is the time to go digital– wholly! Go digital- and be digital, to not just sell but, to put out a helping hand and help your audience in these tough times. Empathy is the key to winning a loyal customer base. As a marketer if you can find innovative ways to ensure that you are reaching out to your consumer, you will be able to make your brand sail through this tough time of crisis.
Marketing technology that can help with the consolidation of your marketing strategies to make them simpler will be the way forward! Adopting new technologies, redirecting budgets for seamless marketing efforts, better measurement of ROI, consolidation of agency partners to a maximum of 3 and bringing in more digitally savvy partners who are technology-agnostic should be some of the key focus areas of 2020.
Offline marketing would also need quicker integrations with adoption of newer technologies for better ROI, and outdoors ads and newspapers will see a definite dip, from that standpoint! Spending on the right channels –and wisely, should be the mantra.
4. Reconsider, review and refocus your costs
If you haven’t experienced already, marketing budgets are seeing freezes, and furloughs and layoffs are everywhere. Relooking at your marketing program is a good place to start with – a marketing audit from a ROI vs investment perspective may be of help. Ideally, choosing a neutral partner with strong data and technology capability to do these audits may be of great value – define parameters together and then review.
Five key focus areas could be around:
1. An agile go-forward plan to a program for an active reinvention of your marketing programs – are you looking at economies of scale or value differentiation?
2. Different incentives for your partners based on performance – a revenue-sharing campaign program with your agencies, where you reward them based on revenue generated could be an opportunity
3. Reprioritizing budgets to fuel growth – conduct audits to ensure your budgets are spent on the right program
4. Building agile and flexible operations – virtual studios (needs technology investments but leads to cost-saving)
5. Exploring areas for a first-mover advantage
5. Bring your team together
People and teams have shown tremendous resilience, adaptability, and throughout this crisis, and I believe it is up to leaders to also stand back for their teams. Leaders should be motivating teams to focus on clients, for looking out for that new opportunity in the market that can help your brand to adapt better and for looking out for ideas along safety, motivation and better adoption of digital rather than worrying about their jobs.
Five key focus areas could be around:
1. Defining short-term metrics for success
2. Creating ‘champions of change’ who could develop robust communication processes
3. Getting the next-gen ready to dive in and learn through change
4. Building virtual studios or offices that can motivate teams to come together, support and co-create
5. Adopting future technologies that can enable teams to collaborate and grow
It is the time to show leadership, park the negativity and spread optimism to the world. Keep your focus on your core strengths, double-down on some important innovations that can solve the challenges faced by your industry and help your organization(s) to spiral towards a faster recovery!
Lets connect on https://www.linkedin.com/in/vijayverghis/