Exploring the Five Rs In the midst of the unexpected COVID-19 pandemic, many companies may be facing uncertainty around their advertising and public-relations strategies. With changing budgets, staffing, and environments, it is essential to foster appropriate communication between your business and your customers. Below are the five steps to making smart marketing decisions during and […]
Exploring the Five Rs
In the midst of the unexpected COVID-19 pandemic, many companies may be facing uncertainty around their advertising and public-relations strategies. With changing budgets, staffing, and environments, it is essential to foster appropriate communication between your business and your customers. Below are the five steps to making smart marketing decisions during and after the pandemic:
1. Reflect: Before creating or adjusting your marketing strategy, you first need to look at your company as a whole. Reach out (and keep reaching out) to your major stakeholders — your top customer segments, employees, and board members, etc. Do more listening than talking. Ask about what they are seeing, feeling, and what they want/need from your business during this time and after the shutdown lifts.
2. Reassure: More than anything, consumers want to know that your company is there for them. That reassuring started with what you were doing to protect them and stop COVID-19’s spread — sanitation efforts, reduced hours, digital offerings, etc. Now, it’s about what discounts and/or informative advice you can give your customers, along with what philanthropic support you can give your community.
3. Reinvent: While this might not be the best time to run your previously scheduled ads, it may be the perfect time to consider a fresh perspective or a possible shift in brand positioning. Give a new look to that old marketing plan. Anything you’re seeing differently in light of COVID-19? Keep in mind, in previous recessions, some of the best ideas for new products and even entire companies came out of this process.
4. Relay: Once you have reflected, reassured, and at least considered reinventing, now it’s time to relay your new set of messages. Resist the urge to pull back advertising spend completely, which could diminish your brand’s resilience and interrupt its momentum. Position yourself as a calm, resilient, and collaborative partner who anticipates the brighter future ahead for all of us.
5. Recover: Anticipate the post-pandemic release, particularly the pent-up consumption of goods and services that help consumers destress, maintain security, and feel “back to normal.” Embrace the new behaviors learned during shutdown, including all those technology barriers overcome.
Jamie Jacobs is partner at Riger Marketing Communications. Contact her at jjacobs@riger.com. (Note: Binghamton University intern Kaitlyn Liu assisted with this article.)