“We must accept finite disappointment, but we must never lose infinite hope.”
– Martin Luther King
These times are tough, no doubt. The global pandemic has affected every business, big or small; every person, rich or poor. When we build a marketing plan, we always keep room for unforeseen situations or circumstances, but no one could ever imagine a set-back like what the Covid-19 pandemic has brought upon businesses.
However, as Martin Luther King said one must never lose infinite hope! If your business has been affected by this pandemic, giving up should never be your course of action. You can still achieve your goals. All it needs is a change in perception and some twists in your marketing strategies. Here are some tried and tested strategies for the Coronavirus downturn that can help you pick up your business and thrive.
#1 Compassion During Tough Times Saves Nine
First and foremost, you need to ensure that you are not all ‘business-minded’ in these tough times when more than half of the world is going through a vulnerable situation. Compassion should not only be your strategy but your nature now. So tone your content accordingly.
For instance, offer some of your services for free or give more discounts. Extend the subscriptions of your customers for a month or two. Send a heartwarming email to your customers, telling them that you are there with them and how you can help them in these times. Encourage your customers to stay safe. Many leading businesses such as coca-cola adopted the same strategy. Here’s a glimpse of their campaign during the pandemic.
#2 Give Hope For The Time After
What do you do after giving the medicine to the wounded? You give them hope that the medicine will do its work and they will be all fine again. Hope is what keeps us all going and these times require that the most. So be there, tell your customers you are working for them and you all will be coming out of this time together.
It will be a great effort if you can show how your business is fighting with the pandemic and its effects. For instance, while all your team is working remotely, you can share a video of how things are being managed, how people are together even though there are geographical differences. Share your lockdown story to keep connected with your customers. If you have any messages for your audience, share them.
#3 Conquer Social Media and Email Marketing
We all know that the pandemic has drastically changed how people consume information. It is obvious that people are more on social media today than ever. They have the time to look into their emails now. So take this opportunity to reach out to them. Spruce up social media marketing strategies. Write on-point emails and get yourself heard. Making an online presence is the most important task to do right now.
This also means that you need to create more online content now in the form of social media posts, blog posts, videos, images, and gifs. You can even increase your social media presence. Be where your customers are. Share your stories with them. Also, pay attention to enhancing your reviews and testimonials. Provide complete customer support. Be prompt. That will help you build a nice reputation.
#4 Offer Something Special in Tough Times
You can prevent your customers from leaving you and can attract more customers even in these times. Only if you are offering something valuable to them. For instance, you might have created an online product to engage your customers. Give special offers on such products.
You can come up with an online sale. You can offer free resources to your customers. All this will reflect that you care about providing your services and not just money.
Create content related to these times raising awareness among your customers. You can share blogs on how to tackle the coronavirus or spread awareness about it. This is also an important aspect of content marketing at these times.
#5 Win The Game of Local SEO
Local businesses have also experienced a major setback during these times. But, this is also the right time when they should change course and go online. A few strategies that can be adopted by local businesses are:
- Provide your details on Google including name, phone number, address and opening hours for your clients and potential customers
- Update your website, post content to keep everyone updated about your business
- Set up social media links if you haven’t already done so. It will help you be in direct contact with your customers.
- Ensure that you are abiding by the local guidelines of your neighbourhood and spread the word about it amongst your customers so that they can feel safe visiting your office.
#6 Inform Customers About The Changes
The pandemic has changed how we used to work, especially the business that used to operate offline majorly. However, if you have decided to introduce some changes in your services due to the need of the hour, make sure your customers are aware of that. For example, if someone used to run a yoga center before, they might shift online and offer online yoga sessions. Similarly, local coaching institutes can start providing online classes to students.
No matter if your services have been largely affected or not, you must keep your customers aware about the changes you have made or about the new things you are offering them during the pandemic. It might not be easy for your audience or existing customers too but you can spread awareness. For example, the teachers of local coaching institutes can encourage the parents to motivate their children to study online by discussing how it can be beneficial.
#7 Utilize the Slow Down For a Big Step Ahead
Well, this could be the time to take a step back so that you can later jump ahead. This could be the time to fulfill all your pending tasks and improve your marketing skills. You can do a SEO audit, learn new strategies of marketing, enhance your website, configure your Google analytics correctly, revamp and revise your social media optimization completely. Use this time to reach out to new people, gather more data, identify patterns, think of new ideas and utilise the resources to their fullest.
Panic is Not The Option
We understand that your marketing campaigns cannot be the same like the ones before the pandemic. But do not fall victim of the panic move and stop marketing at all. Build your course of action with the resources you have. See what more you need and how can you get that. Not many people might be needing your services right away but there will be a time when things will get back to normal. Prepare for that time.
Last but not least, see how others are coping up. Every business has been affected by the pandemic, but what strategies are they following now. Learn from them. Remember, we do not need to stop. We just have to alter our paths. Just like you need customers, they need you. So fill up your marketing strategies with strength, compassion and empathy and not just data and analytics and see the change.
Jessica Jones
Jessica Jones is an academic writer at GoDissertationHelp, a Company based in the UK which provides all kind of academic help to the students. She loves to write about technology, education, marketing, digital marketing, Life, etc. She is working in GoDissertationHelp, an academic writing service which provides the best dissertation writing service.