Marketing In a Pandemic—What's The Current Situation and Where Do I Go From Here?

"Marketing & Social Media: More Important Than Ever?" (Yes, it is.) I just co-moderated this session yesterday during the Wisconsin Tech Council's virtual Entrepreneurs' Conference and we had a fruitful conversation about the current landscape of marketing during this time, and actionable takeaways you can implement today. Let's dive into those below!

What's the framework for understanding the marketing landscape?

Think through your buyer's journey. Buyer's:

• Become aware they have a problem. They don't know the name of that problem... but they feel the effects or symptoms of it. (Awareness)
• Put a name to their problem, and then need to determine all possible options to resolve the issue—for example, if my car engine died and my car isn't working, I could buy a new engine, buy a new or used car, or go green and bike or walk everywhere. (Consideration)
• Determine which specific option will address their problem in the way best suited for them, and determine with product or service provider will help them get the job done. (Decision)

What's going on from an awareness standpoint?

• Consumers are... consuming (a lot more than before March 1).
• They are browsing, educating themselves and researching on websites and social media.
• Prospects are hungry for human connection, especially with conferences canceling. 
• Ad engagement is dropping… but paid ads are cheap right now and ROI is HIGH.

What can you do?

• Revisit your website’s SEO strategy (Get in front of the people researching online!).
• Create content!... but be thoughtful about it—especially important in the last 2 weeks.
• Show the human side of your business—get personal, get vulnerable.
• If advertising on social, be VERY specific and targeted in your message and your audience targeting.
• Pivot your conference strategy!

Example of a conference strategy pivot: Team Accelity has had several canceled or now virtual conferences this year. We took those conference lists and reached out to attendees we wanted to talk to. It was a pretty simple message - "Hey, it sucks that we can't meet each other, we wanted to connect with you there. Can we chat?" The result: 11% of the people we connected with turned into opportunties.

What's going on from a consideration standpoint?

• “We’re here to help” message is starting to fatigue.
• Talking to some startups right now who will still die on a hill for the “introduction” email (the email that says, "Hi, Name, I'm X and I want to introduce you to my business" - ummm, the recipient never asked and they don't care)...
• ...however, most businesses are shifting away from the hard sell >> adding value.

What can you do?

• Find your unique value; if everyone is saying it… it’s not unique.
• Give away your secrets—Accelity gives away our processes all the time to build credibility.
• Create “they ask, you answer” content—this means that your buyers have questions that product or service providers simply are not answering. This is a blue ocean opportunity. Whoever answers first, will build credibility and win business.
• LinkedIn heavy sales DMs don’t put the customer first—if you’re doing this, stop.

What's going on from a decision standpoint?

• Marketing email & social media engagement is picking up (to higher than pre-COVID levels).
• Sales pipelines are gaining momentum (a 6% growth each week since mid-May).
• Consultative, 1:1 selling is winning... guess what? This will ALWAYS win, pandemic or not.

What can you do?

• Create marketing campaigns with forward-thinking/future-focused messages that educate and add value.
• Promote the "what's in it for me?" of your business product or service and be consultative! The buyer should always understand the benefit to them. They won't care who you are before that.
• Leverage account-based marketing to be strategic about prospect outreach

If you have other thoughts, let's chat in the comments below!