The State of Branding during COVID-19, what is the best thing do?
The State of Branding During COVID-19, What is the Best Thing Do?
If you’re like most business leaders, you’ve probably put brand-building on the back burner as you deal with the COVID-19 pandemic. 81% of companies have deferred marketing, according to the World Federation of Advertisers. And even Google is slashing its marketing budgets by as much as half for the second half of the year (CNBC.)
But pulling back on marketing can have serious, long-term consequences. According to the Advertising Research Foundation, brands that “go dark” in a downturn take five years, on average, to recover market share.
Let’s list some point about what’s happened in this first quarter of 2020:
Many researches, conducted in late March, two weeks after stay-at-home directives were issued in much of the U.S. , identified many new patterns in consumer shopping behavior and mindset. Here some some key findings.
Broad shifts in consumer behavior:
The location and timing of shopping (whether in person or online).
The composition of the basket of products purchased (emergency preparedness supplies, health care products, and cleaning items).
A reduction in shopping frequency and an increase in the average basket size.
Stocking up on nonperishables and hard-to-find items.
Increased readiness to try direct-to-consumer offerings or to shop online at stores that offer home delivery.
Shifts in consumer mindset and attitudes:
Focus on function (that is, purchase behavior driven by category availability and type of benefit more than by brand preference).
Growth of interest in brands that combine functional performance with pro-social behavior by their parent companies.
Loss of interest in status-driven purchases that have strong components of conspicuous consumption (that is, items that are consumed/displayed publicly).
Interest in how the companies behind the brands are treating their employees.
Businesses have seen the direct impact of all this with most of the businesses becoming seriously hard-pressed and at the same time a few digital businesses picking up drastically. Given the unpredictability and speed with which the situation is changing, it has become really tricky for the brands to communicate.
COVID-19 has transformed how we operate as brands. Now, brand professionals are wondering how to put their best foot forward in these times of “business-as-unusual”.
“COVID-19 has transformed how we operate as brands. Now, brand professionals are wondering how to put their best foot forward in these times of business-as-unusual.”
Don’t Go Into Hibernation Mode
COVID-19 outbreak has definitely overthrown all the marketing plans out of window. Many businesses have been hit. But we know that situation will slowly improve and we will be back to our regular activities. Just because you might have to reduce dollars allocated to marketing, doesn’t mean you can’t protect your brand during the crisis and prepare your brand for the post COVID-19 world. You just need to shift your brand-building approach from marketing tactics to enterprise-wide efforts.
By gathering industry-wide perspectives on how teams are dealing with the current crisis, we can all benefit from the findings—whether that’s recognizing common challenges, or providing reassurance on how to recalibrate brand strategies going forward.
What does it mean?
Everything you do is marketing these days. From your employee’s community service and corporate social responsibility (CSR) work to your company communications on social media and a letter from the CEO on your website, everything your organization does shapes people’s opinions of your brand and influences their decisions about whether to do business with you now and in the future.
“Everything you do is marketing these days”
So ensure every touchpoint, every activity reinforces and interprets your brand positioning and personality. Think of how you can turn your interactions with employees, business partners, communities as well as customers into powerful messages about your brand. Transform your company’s everyday actions into extraordinary ones and you’ll naturally attract attention and improve your brand perceptions.
You know, there’s been a lot of talk lately about brand storytelling but story-doing has a lot more impact. You don’t need to run ads telling people you care about them and their communities. Take action to actually help others and you will be strengthening your brand far more effectively and sustainably.
Also to protect your brand now and ensure it is strong and valuable in the future, develop your digital customer experience (CX).
The lockdown has transformed the way customers research, browse, shop, and pay -- even B2B customers are making decisions through digital channels because salespeople aren’t meeting with them in person. And the trend to digital customer experience will likely continue even after the crisis as people develop new habits and get used to the convenience.
Research by American Express found that 86% of customers are willing to pay more for a better experience.
While recently, the Temkin Group published a study and found that companies that earn $1 billion annually can expect to earn, on average, an additional $700 million within 3 years of investing in customer experience.
That's a 70% increase in revenue within 36 months!
Put simply:
Companies who successfully implement a customer experience strategy achieve higher customer satisfaction rates, reduced customer churn and increased revenues.
CX is an integral part of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and the reason why it’s important is because a customer who has a positive experience with a business is more likely to become a repeat and loyal customer.
So, your digital customer experience has become your primary marketing channel -- and that means you’re now competing on e-commerce capabilities, mobile-first design, cashless payments and cross-channel logistics and fulfillment.
Apply the disciplines of marketing in these areas to assert your brand leadership:
Create a clear customer experience vision
Understand who your customers are
Create an emotional connection with your customers
Capture customer feedback in real time
Use a quality framework for development of your team
Act upon regular employee feedback
Measure the ROI from delivering great customer experience
In addition to this, and the most important thing is:
Generate solutions, not just campaigns, In the last two months’ brands have been quick to empathize and inspire us in times of crisis. But that will not be enough anymore. It is easy to do campaigns but unless they bring solutions to consumer’s problems in these changed times, they would be lost in a whiff.
“Generate solutions, not just campaigns”
Conclusion
Customer expectations are higher than ever and word of mouth travels fast!
And as the customer becomes even more empowered, it increases the importance of the customer experience.
Customer experience is an area that needs constant nurturing and care and, with a greater focus on customer experience strategy, companies will realize a positive impact on customer loyalty, higher retention and increased revenue growth.
You might be in survival mode, but now is the time to ensure your brand will be well-positioned in the future. Continue to build your brand by treating everything you do as marketing, and take your digital customer experience to the next level.
“You might be in survival mode, but now is the time to ensure your brand will be well-positioned in the future.”
