Marketing your products and services during a global crisis may not always seem appropriate. Not only is it harder to create content with COVID-19 restrictions on you and your staff, but it is also important to make sure that your marketing is considerate and appropriate, otherwise your customers may view you as being insensitive.
Keep your customers updated
Businesses across many industries are shutting down or changing their business practices due to the coronavirus. The first thing many customers will be looking for is whether they can still access your products and services. If there have been any changes that may affect your customers, be sure to include updates in your marketing content. Even if it’s still business as usual, it’s a good idea to also explicitly let customers know and erase uncertainty.
Modify your marketing
Adjusting your marketing content to be topical and relevant to the current situation can demonstrate your business’ care and understanding. Make sure that your content doesn’t encourage customers to break social distancing rules and unsafe practices. You can do this by marketing how your products and services can be used at home rather than outside. Additionally, ensure that the visuals that accompany your content are appropriate to the situation; this can mean avoiding images of crowds, public spaces and people interacting closely.
Adjust planned content
If you had campaigns and posts lined up before COVID-19 escalated, they may not be appropriate for the current situation. This doesn’t mean you have to scrap the content altogether, but it might be a good idea to put certain campaigns on hold to maximise their effectiveness and avoid the risk of insensitivity.
Tailor your offers
Find the most relevant aspects of your business that may be useful for your customers during social distancing and quarantine. This could mean highlighting the delivery and take-away aspect of your service or focusing on products beneficial for productivity and entertainment at home.
Jump on the ‘support local’ movement
Many social media pages and groups have been created to advertise small and local businesses that may be struggling during this time. The initiative has spiked in popularity, with plenty of pages already having thousands of followers. Contacting these pages as a small business can give you the attention of hundreds of local customers.
