Photograph: Anna Shvets
Marketing during the coronavirus pandemic is a challenge and we are here to help.
The global COVID19 pandemic has created widespread disruption for businesses across the world. Many businesses are facing delayed supply chains or supply chain shortages, others are facing a 90% drop in demand while again others are facing unprecedented demand increases. For all of these companies, particularly for smaller businesses, e-commerce, retail, tech startups and app companies it is a confusing situation with no clear correct answers for what is going to come next or the correct actions to take. Uncertainty is at an all-time high as evident by the lowered stock market sentiment.
Let’s take a look at what you should be doing with marketing and advertising during the coronavirus pandemic.
Communication is key!
Regardless of what type of company you are, continue to make use of communication channels such as social media, website updates, and email content to keep customers up to date on what your current situation is. Regardless of if you are running out of inventory due to high demand, reducing hours or temporary closing to keep your workers safe, communicate this clearly and regularly via the channels above.
Make it easy for your customers to find out what the current situation is and the availability of your products and services. Particularly for restaurants, your customers will want to know what types of service you are continuing to offer- whether that’s limited dining room service, take out, delivery, curbside etc. Daily updates for businesses that are experiencing rapid change would be recommended.
If you are an essential business communicate clearly as to what steps you are taking to provide a safe environment for your customers and employees. This will provide a reassuring message for visitors and let them know you are focusing hard on doing the right thing.
Employee and Customer Safety
Safety for your guests and employees is of critical importance. Without your team, your business can’t function, even worst would be the prospect of an employee or customer getting seriously ill. As has been seen recently in the media, several large ecommerce warehouses and food suppliers have had outbreaks in their facilities which has crippled their ability to continue operations and thus reducing drastically their revenue and creating a media whirlwind.
Taking even basic steps as outlined by the CDC is a great way to create a layer of safety for guests and customers. While of course this doesn’t reduce the risk of transmission completely, it does help. Even if masks and gloves are optional in your location by state or local mandate, your employees should be wearing them as much as possible. It is such an easy step that can reduce transmission and make everyone feel much safer.
Post-Coronavirus Planning
As some states start to reopen, you need to start thinking about what a post-coronavirus world looks like for your business. While it is impossible to accurately predict how long the economic slump will last, how much pent up consumer demand there will be, and where additional coronavirus hotspots will pop up, you do need to be planning how to adjust operations to fit this new environment. For many, masks and gloves, reduced dining room capacity, continued curbside pick and other currently practiced processes will continue very likely until late fall.
The tone and timing of your marketing communications needs to be sensitive to the current situation with a focus on providing a safe environment for customers and employees alike. There are also opportunities to provide special pricing on certain items to drive demand as businesses reopen. Also for restaurants, doing a weekly carry out special is a great way to drive traffic while also being helpful to customers, many of whom are facing salary cuts or worse.
Videos are an important tool
Many marketers are utilizing videos to communicate, even simple videos with little production and a low budget, but these videos are a great way to get across the authenticity of your safety measures and changes to schedules or new offers. For many of our clients, the tone and content of video marketing has transformed drastically from a hard selling style to a more toned down, branding and safety focused video. It’s important for marketers to also be conscientious of their budgets as well, and simple videos don’t have to break the bank.
One of the best bang for you buck ways to get great reach via your marketing and communication updates that we discussed above is to make these updates through simple video content via your social media channels. An important rationale for the focus on social media videos and number over quantity is due to the share ability and reach of this content via mobile social media. Share these videos on your youtube channel, facebook page, twitter, instagram, linkedin and website! You will be surprised at the amount of shares and comments you will get, often asking more questions about potentially reopening or just generally positive comments regarding your stance towards keeping employees and customers safe.
Here is an example of a Coronavirus branding spot we produced recently that is currently being run on both broadcast and shared on social media outlets. The response has been very positive and our client was able to stabilize sales more than initially thought as the coronavirus continued.
If there is anywhing we can do to help, let us know. Volan Media provides marketing and advertising services of all kinds to small and large businesses across many industries. We are happy to provide a no cost consultation for any business that needs help to pivot their marketing during this incredible challenging environment for businesses. Let’s talk.
