This article has different way of approaching this pandemic by bridging gaps formed by Covid 19. Though there are serious clinical trials for candidate vaccines have begun in numerous parts of the world, what keeps us growing during this pandemic is, social distancing & supporting business from remote.
We should admit that consumer attitude & behaviors are changing as the world faces critical lockdown. Hence marketers should take it seriously as companies must prepare to meet the needs of consumers until things resume back normal. Due to corona virus intervention, many businesses started to adjust the changing needs of their clients, people, suppliers & dealers.
However, the John Hopkins University’s report shows there are 2 million confirmed cases of corona virus world-wide. More than 600,000 cases have been recorded in the US alone this is quiet alarming figures. So to survive in this extreme catastrophic situation, marketers should look for innovation, resilience & empathy. This can be the best time for any company to think about new dimension to of marketing through digital platforms maintaining thumb rule of social distancing.
We like to share few ideas on how to marketers should adapt B2B marketing & sales strategy during this COVID-19 crisis:
Make sure you keep yourself & organization out of the headlines in virus spread. Whenever possible, it is advisable to support from home. Since everyone is panicking right now it’s highly no time to show your needs, rather address your audience in the first place to stay relevant to your audience.
Ask yourself & review if existing campaigns are still running with proper context & niche audience. It is one of the best ways to explore & play safe with current & upcoming digital trends. Also help your teams to explore & test a new set of audience. In case of targeting a broader audience, once you setup campaign, let algorithms work & look for new users who are likely to get convert.
To support their customers & frontline employee’s commercial leaders framing different strategy as COVID -19 pandemic cancelled all public events and forced professionals to work remotely, shutting entire segments of the economy.
These are few quarantine findings, which allows companies to rethink about their need for online brand promotion & engage customers throughout lockdown:
- Most of the marketers except their overall marketing may cut moderately or fully.
- 60% to 80% of plans cancel for all live & scheduled events
- Companies should start to focus on content creation, online events & search marketing.
- Segmenting marketing needs by industry wise, healthcare companies anticipate stable or increased marketing budgets.
- Small-sized range companies may see steep budget cuts, while mid-sized can maintain it to the original level as planned for 2020.
- Boost in streaming services & increase of virtual events
Check out following ideas on adjusting your PR strategy during this COVID-19 pandemic:
Anticipate customer Behavior & Requirements:
Social distancing & lockdown is tough to identify & address customer needs before it arise as a problem area. It becomes important for the marketers to understand the emerging patterns. Real time insights & technologies can anticipate the declining customer needs. It also becomes essential for the marketers & brands to establish real time assurance.
Make sure you’re active in the digital world:
As lockdown made people to spend more time on entertainment, social media for connecting with the outside world, with disrupted marketing initiatives you can reach marketers where they are. Create webinars in the comfort of users; do live video in any social platforms to engage your audience. Social media is a boon when we’re maintaining social distancing. Make sure all your online information are up to date & lined up with target audience expectation. Create regular content which keeps you & your brand top of everything.
Clean up digital space:
Refine & clean up your SEO & B2B marketing strategy to ensure blog, website & social profiles are fresh & optimized. Spread a word or urge your followers to help communities who are affected by COVID virus.
Build positivity & morale within teams & clients:
Conduct virtual meeting, video conference & open ended ways to encourage collaborative & familiar environments. Leadership should use of new tools, collaboration software for sharing documents & priority update project updates.
Healthcare:
Digital health firms & start-ups have an opportunity to assist health care workers in diagnosing & minimizing the outbreak numbers. US has seen a tremendous increase in telemedicine providers extending their support to connect patients with health care professionals as they are being advised to take care by comforting at home. Adoption of RPM(Remote patient monitoring) drastically increased as companies started using AI powered tools to help clinicians to track infected patients. Researchers & drug makers joining hands with cloud developers to speed up drug development process & test on humans. Additionally we can see increased collaboration between researchers & pharmaceutical companies concentrate more on tackling novel corona virus outbreak.
Learn to embrace change & work on making better communication strategy. Constantly brainstorm & try to understand what success looks to you & your customer during this pandemic outbreak time.
It is essential to stay calm, stay home in this panic time & more importantly have a sense of responsibility when it comes to your clients, team as well as family.
