The Global Pandemic has imposed unprecedented challenges on lives and businesses. The plunge in economic activities has impacted businesses in numerous ways. Owing to social distancing norms, many industrial processes, such as manufacturing, supply chain, and marketing, have also been interrupted. Companies are also suspending much of their operations due to a lack of resources and revenue.
Some companies have also briefly halted their digital marketing campaigns due to a shortage of resources and operational capacities. However, it could hurt more than you think. Let’s understand why.
Why Should You Keep Investing In Digital Marketing?
It’s worth noting that digital marketing isn’t about selling goods and services or generating revenue right away. It’s a way to keep your customers connected with your brand. The results of digital marketing are not visible overnight. Many successful companies understand that digital marketing strategies like SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and SMM (Social Media Marketing) take at least three to four months before they give results.
So…if your company continues to ignore digital marketing, you can see a sharp decline in online traffic, revenue, customer loyalty and contact, and search engine rankings. On the contrary, you need to boost your digital marketing even more. Let’s discuss why.
Your Audience Is More Online Than Ever
Although the coronavirus has had disastrous health, economic, and social repercussions, we are lucky that technology has progressed so far that we can still communicate and collaborate. The global digital population is increasing exponentially year on year. There were around 4.66 billion active internet users worldwide, making for about 59.5 percent of the world population. With 313 million internet users, the USA ranks third in the digital community.
To maintain social distance and prevent coronavirus, people are not traveling or going out for recreation. It has just added to the already massive increase in internet traffic. They use the internet to buy products and have entertainment. Your audience is on the internet, and you cannot afford to stop engaging with them because your competitors will not stop. However, as the economy is witnessing a decline in demand, it is critical to be smart, focused, and innovative in your digital engagement strategies.
Know Your Target Audience
It’s difficult to engage with your audience if you don’t know who they are. Most advertisers used to depend on their best guess as to who their target customers should be. But people’s preferences change. Your intended audience a decade ago may no longer be your target consumers today.
For instance, when millennials became the largest demographic group in the USA, it also made one of the largest consumer groups who were eating out. Millennials care more about healthy food habits than their predecessors. As a result, fast-food restaurants such as McDonald’s had to adapt their menus to meet the changing needs of their customers. They offered a more nutritious menu as well as a higher-end coffee than plain cola.
McD analyzed and modified its products and services to their target market. Similarly, adapt your marketing strategies for a well-defined audience. However, first, you need to know who they are.
Today, you have tools like Google Analytics, search console, etc., to provide an insight about the visitors. You can know what they are looking for, what is the conversion rate, etc. Analyze the comparative evidence from different studies on internet patterns. Create buyer personas that represent the demographics of your target audience and how they behave online.
To build your brand as a trustworthy authority in your domain, try to engage with your existing and potential customers and solve their problems. How do you go about doing that? Through your content.
Rethink Your Content
The pandemic has changed people’s priorities and routines. Your previous engagement method may no longer be effective. It’s a good idea to reconsider the emails you send out, the content you create, and your overall approach toward your customers.
It is this part where you realize that content marketing, or digital marketing in general, is not just about selling your products or services. Keeping the buyers’ personae in mind, try to comprehend their concerns and questions. Analyze how the pandemic has affected your target audience and what are their pain points. One way to do this is by sending out easy-to-answer email surveys to your current and potential customers. Keep it objective; however, you can add a couple of open-ended questions to have a broader perspective on your customers.
You can then use this information to rethink your engagement strategies. Using the analysis, restructure your advertisements, blog posts, email campaigns, newsletters, videos, podcasts, and webinars. Ensure that your content caters to your target audience’s needs and addresses the most pressing concerns.
Create content that demonstrates empathy. For example, If you’re a home service provider, people may not be eager to hire your services to maintain social distance and save cash-in-hand. In such a situation, you can write blogs/newsletters about simple do-it-yourself guides on something like, “how to apply enamel paint on your walls.” Stay consistent and innovate ways to connect with your audience on their pain points. It demonstrates that your primary emphasis is on resolving consumer problems, and creates a positive brand image that will compel customers to transact with you in the future.
Better Conversion Rates with Payment Plans
eCommerce companies are leveraging payment plans to ease the financial burden of their customers during the pandemic-time economy. But, payment plans aren’t exclusive to eCommerce. Even if you’re offering IT consulting services, or online courses, you could still integrate a weekly/monthly installment plan to sell your services/products.
According to Neil Patel, payment plans are a simple way to increase conversion rates, particularly now that more consumers are trying to reduce their cash spend in the short term.
The good news is that you have ready-made solutions available. Installment payment providers, like Shopify, PayPal Credit, Sezzle, Magento, Big Commerce, etc., have already done the legwork for you. You only need to integrate them for your checkout page on your end.
Cheaper Ad Campaigns + High Internet Traffic = More ROI on Advertising
Google and other large ad networks earn money from auctions. Small companies, in practice, push up the cost per click (CPC) advertisements because they see the benefit of promoting their company. As a result, the CPC boosts, pushing big businesses to spend more money on this advertising.
Unfortunately, due to Covid-19, many small businesses have gone out of business or halted their operations. They are not spending much on advertising like CPC. However, this represents an opportunity for you to have a lower cost in advertising.
Furthermore, the audience is spending far more time at home on the internet. Since internet traffic is high and the CPC is minimal, the return-on-investment on these advertisements has shot through the roof.
Since businesses do not have a large marketing budget to work with, the CPM (cost per thousand impressions) on advertising has also decreased significantly. It’s an ideal time to invest in a successful Facebook ad campaign that will help you produce more leads and sales at a low cost.
However, cheap doesn’t mean free. Moreover, you’re spending the most crucial resource on these campaigns, i.e., your time. So, carefully invest it. Online advertising will only benefit if done right. To ensure that your online ads have a significant impact, keep them relevant and consistent.
Similarly, knowing which platform will help you reach your target audience is also crucial. For instance:
- If you’re a food delivery service app, you can find Millennials and GenZ demographic on Instagram and Snapchat. This demographic may be living alone or isolated, away from their hometown for work. Stuck in the pandemic, they would crave gourmet food more than people of other generations.
- If you are running a rehabilitation center, target google ads and organic SEO more.
- If you have a home decor business, target users on Instagram, and Pinterest to share home decor ideas and pictures.
- If you’re having a B2B technology business, LinkedIn can be a good focus area.
- If you’re a brick-and-mortar business, focus on google ranking, google ads, engage with your target audience on Facebook. Go beyond just social media, and write blog posts or hire digital marketing services.
The examples provided above will help you envision your plan for locating and engaging your target audience.
Customer Retention Is the Key
Your company must adopt the traits of the people you’re aiming to reach. It entails being compassionate, resourceful, and flexible. We can no longer push ads and promotions at people we assume will purchase them. People are adept at spotting sales gimmicks, especially at times when they are too cautious with spending their money.
Furthermore, while you are making efforts into piquing the internets of prospective customers, do not forget to engage your existing ones. According to statistics, getting sales from an existing customer has a 60–70% chance of success. According to other surveys, existing customers are 50% more likely than potential customers to try new products. They also help generate 31 percent more revenue.
Engaging your existing customers has dual benefits. Even when things aren’t ideal, a reliable, optimistic overall consumer experience will fuel engagement. And these customers will talk about your business through reviews and testimonials, piquing the interest of the prospects with whom you want to do business.
Conclusion
Sadly, the coronavirus pandemic has lasted longer than expected. On a personal level, we need to take care of ourselves and our families by following the government guidelines. From a professional standpoint, however, even though certain business operations are halted, you cannot stop working on your business. It’s now more than ever that you need to focus on connecting with your customers and developing your marketing strategies.
As the online landscape has increased in size, having a digital marketing plan for your business has become increasingly important. The internet has now become a lifeline for most industries as a result of the pandemic. Marketers must strive to redefine the digital customer experience in empathetic and innovative ways.