6 lessons from Covid-19: What marketers should be doing

The global pandemic is scaring business owners across all industries and in all sectors.

In our role as marketers, we should guide and advise our clients through these critical days, using discipline expertise and a unique approach.

Here are six tips to help:

• Be proactive
  Contact clients immediately to learn what effects they are seeing on their employees and sales and profits. Make recommendations for new messaging to convey alternative ways they’re doing business and how they are supporting the community. Once you understand what the business is experiencing, make recommendations with sound rationale.
• Be nimble
  Your client’s message may need to convey one thing this week and something else the next. Be prepared to get these changes made swiftly. Consider all audiences and all touchpoints, from website to digital ads, and from Google My Business listings to media. Some edits can be made very quickly and others will take more planning and time to execute. Do what you can as soon as you can.
• Be selfless
  Show your clients you are in this together and offer ongoing support. A lot of companies say they work as an extension of their clients’ teams. Essentially these are meaningless words unless your style and approach really demonstrate how you function with an ownership mentality. Particularly in this difficult time, make recommendations that are in the businesses’ best interests and not your own. This could mean a reduction in services.
• Be connected
  Continue to communicate with your clients to listen to updates and offer solutions and recommendations, even if you’re not financially engaged to do so. Recognize that in some cases it may even make sense for businesses to substantially pull back marketing budgets.
• Be a resource
  If you have crisis communication expertise, offer counsel to your client. Share relevant industry information that can help give your client valuable perspective. Explore opportunities for your client to offer thought leadership to others.
• Be prepared
  No one knows just what the new norm will be, but that doesn’t mean we can’t think about and prepare for how to communicate and market re-openings. What permanent effect did the pandemic have on a business’s operations? What should the brand’s messaging be moving forward? What may have changed in how to reach target audiences?

The approach we take in challenging times is applicable to what it takes to be a truly great marketing partner even when we’re not in the midst of a global pandemic.

How can your marketer step up for you?