Brands doing a great job of adapting their marketing right now

We’re seeing some crazy things right now…

For some, they’ve been forced to not earn any income. For others, it’s boom time, and for a majority of others income has been hampered.

Some businesses will close down as a result, many will need to pivot slightly in order to stay viable. Others will be fine, they just need to wait for the world to press play again.

One thing we are noticing for everyone, it hasn’t been this cheap to advertise in a LONG time…

There has never been a better time to cheaply build an audience from the massess of people going online, consuming content like crazy. Doing this well will position your brand for a slingshot recovery when the bounce back occurs.

So here is our guide on how to adapt your marketing for this situation and examples of brands doing a great job of it.

What to change in your marketing right now

Don’t have any communication running that is either urgency based or scarcity based, it’s not appropriate right now. If you have email automations running, or old ads running (that were previously fine) talking about scarcity offers, turn them off now.

Don’t appear to be trying to profit out of fear. It may be appropriate for you to park the sales pitch completely for a while, and instead focus on helping wherever possible. I’ve had a few panicked calls recently from people needing urgent help, and traditionally where there is a dire need, is usually where you can charge higher prices – but it’s not about that right now, it’s about helping where possible.

Focus on being relevant and empathetic. If you put yourself in the shoes of your customers, is this message relevant right now? Or is it out of place? And are we conveying empathy?

Brands doing a great job of this right now:

Microsoft teams:
Microsoft teams have offered a 6 month free trial of their premium business chat & collaboration tool.

Obviously there are many companies with a large need for this right now, and they’ll earn a lot of ongoing revenue out of this move.

Babbel:
Babbel, the language learning app, has offered 6 months free. With so many at home, and with extra time on their hands, learning a language is an exciting use of that time.

Many users will get hooked before the end of the 6 months, and Babbel will have a bunch of new customers afterwards.

Zoom:
Zoom is offering unrestricted use for schools during this time, lifting their 40 minute meeting limit for schools.

Audible:
Audible has offered free stories for children while schools are closed around the world.

Fitness industry:
Everybody has to workout from home now. There are many in-person gyms and personal trainers who are now offering online personal training for free.

Chris Hemsworth has also offered his home workout app free for a 6 week trial.

We’ll continue to update this list as we see more examples, but the common themes is this:

• Help where you can, and potentially for free (or discounted)
• Build an audience in the process, that will position you to slingshot when the bounce back occurs

How can you build an audience right now?

This is probably the single most important question relating to your marketing right now.

If you’re a physical product/service, how can you transition into being a media company for the time being? Capturing an audience of your ideal customers, nurturing them, and positioning yourself to maximise the bounce back when it occurs.

If you’re an online product, that people aren’t buying right now – how can you add value for free?

What else should you be doing?

If you do have some down time, think about ways to improve all those things you’ve wanted to for a long time but were always too busy (while of course keeping an eye on cash flow):

Improve your SEO:
More people are online browsing than ever, and if they’re not browsing for your product/service right now, are they likely to when normalcy returns? If so, get yourself in a good ranking position to make the most of that.

Post more content:
Create videos, write blog posts, and post more on social. Prove your authority, and provide value.

Plan for the bounce back:
If you think your product/service will still be required in the world after Coronavirus, then start planning your marketing funnel for then as well. It doesn’t all have to be about this week and next, plan ahead.

What we’re doing:

In order to try and help as much as posible, we’re doing 2 things:

• Free consults if you want to chat about potential ways to pivot yourself out of this, or how you should be adapting your marketing
• Pay per performance marketing – we know there is a lot to do, but cash flow is tight. If we work on a pay per performance arrangement, that will help your cash flow in the short-term, and help us get more reward in the long-term (but only if it works).