Digital Marketing in a Changing Marketplace

1. Check Your Goals, Targets and Realign

Consider what your KPIs (key performance indicators) are right now. Do those KPIs shift from lead generation to contact building, or perhaps to brand engagement? And how do your marketing tactics and messaging need to evolve to achieve these new goals? Are your current marketing materials going to work with a new economic outlook and new customer engagement patterns? Now ask the same questions for what we predict conditions to be like 3- and 6-months from now.

Be nimble and strategic at the same time. You can’t put a pause on your brand or your marketing “until this is over”, because who really knows if, and when, things will return to what they were. For the foreseeable future there will be changing conditions, and marketing needs to be able to refocus and meet the right KPIs, probably more than once.

2. Be Mindful of Message Tone, Timing & Delivery

Marketing messages and sponsored content need to pay attention to the emotional pulse of the reader, as well as consider timing of when it is released. Right now, with coronavirus news highly visible, the content your marketing may appear within, or directly alongside, could be highly-charged. Be thoughtful when creating messaging and materials so that you are sensitive to the current situations. Appearing to be too “hard sale” or business-focused may be off-putting to customers, and potentially even damage your brand’s position.

Carefully consider the words you select in your messaging:

• Avoid charged words that could look to capitalize on or minimize the situation.
• Consider alternative phrases such as “navigate” rather than “advance” or “identify responses” rather than “identify opportunities”.
• Be careful about using words that are becoming trite, such as “new normal”.
• Avoid sentiments or references that can become outdated quickly, if you are trying to keep your assets running for weeks or months.

3. Be Relevant & Stand Out

Artfully combining relevant content, marketing messaging and brand positions (that – as noted in the above – are mindful of tone and timing) will connect with customers in a powerful way, get attention and generate response. Interestingly, while some companies reacted by turning off all marketing, good marketing strategies acknowledged current conditions and saw results. A recent article by AdTaxi found that 62% of people found advertising with COVID-19 messaging was well intentioned, and 68% found it helpful that messaging considered the current situation.

4. Stay On Top of The Digital Trends

However, we must consider how users are engaging with content much differently than just a few weeks ago. Right now, interest-based campaigns that reach customers higher in the marketing sales funnel are outperforming text search campaigns. Be sure your digital marketing team, or the agency you partner with, is remaining nimble – interpreting data, watching the shifts and repositioning ad campaigns to continually maximize return.

Beyond just increasing social activity, how are you altering your desktop verses mobile ad deployment, ad timing, content delivery and platforms?

5. Track & Shift

One positive point is that most marketers already have heavily integrated data tracking tools into their performance reviews. The increases in digital engagement over past weeks has provided enough data for marketers to extract trends, analyze patterns and make predictions. Staying attuned to performance metrics is critical now. Marketers who are on top of the data and can be nimble – adjusting while staying on plan – have an opportunity for significant success.