Impacts and 8 Marketing Strategies for Small Business that Suffered from Covid-19

The World Health Organisation has stated the COVID 19 or coronavirus, a pandemic. It’s an unresolved time with several unknowns. We don’t have all the solutions, but there are some pieces of advice for small businesses that may have experienced and still experiencing shifts in their businesses.

Everyone has been affected by the coronavirus pandemic, so are the small businesses which are feeling unprotected right now. We are here to guide you recognize the next best step for your business. We understand that the present situation is not in favor of your business.

You might be thinking of different questions like – How will your business survive? How will you generate leads? How will you earn? How will you market your business?

This COVID 19 period might have been a difficult situation for numerous businesses but this has also come up as a great opportunity for you to modify what you have been doing. Develop a pandemic business strategy and make attempts to change the world once this crisis ends.

If you are also among the ones who are finding ways to market their business, then we stand with you extending a helping hand.

Pandemic Impacted All

What is common among a shop owner/product seller, an event planner and a physician? Well, all of them are small business owners challenged by Covid-19 business impact. They can have distinct stories but have an identical journey. Undoubtedly, the current situation is common for everyone.

But, do you have any idea about how many of your major competitors are still in a position to cope with this time well? The reason behind their proper management is that they understand the importance of digital marketing specifically in the current state.

Just take your life example! What you and your customers do mostly? Presumably, be active on social media, surf the internet, and make a limitless number of Google searches online! Therefore, this time is ideal for you to show your business to the customers on these online platforms.

Forget about yesterday and how you were running your business in the past. Today, it has become a completely new game. There exist distinct survival strategies, different plans, and separate journeys.

Start Afresh

Whether you wish to create a survival strategy by yourself or wish to take the help of an expert digital marketer, target “zero-based planning” first.

Start afresh! Start with no assumptions and begin working on a blank notepad. Redesign completely different online marketing plans to get through this tough time.

8 Online marketing strategies for your business during COVID-19 lockdown

The industry and market might not be good yet you can strive to attain a small goal by following few successful online marketing plans. Here, we present before you the 8 best methods you can market your business online and aid your business pull through the tough phase.

1. Communicate openly and stay connected with your customers

Everyone understands the present condition, even your clients. So, if you will communicate openly to your clients and express what your business is experiencing, they might feel more connected to you. Your customers may sympathize with you or your companies that are troubled. But, this will only be possible if you make open and transparent communications with them and tell them about the COVID-19 business impact.

You can share the concept of the product and take the solution offered by the customers. Keep folks updated. Regardless of the type of business, you have got—whether you have a clothing store or you run a hair salon—several people out there who are willing to hear from you. Consider sending email updates regularly to keep the discussion going with your fans, customers, and friends.

2. Reach out to potential customers

Detecting new customers might be a tough job especially during this pandemic crisis, where nobody wishes to go out and everybody prefers to stay homes for safety reasons. So, this has now become more essential than ever to find probable customers/clients. The best possible way to detect them is to go to them where they are!

We are not saying to go door to door, but to market your business, you need to reach where they are present, and possibly most of the time social media and internet are the best places to reach them out. You need to follow the marketing goals strides to reach the eventual result of building a reputation. If people can’t reach your business in-person, form an idea about creative techniques you can take your business to them.

3. Be Resourceful

There are several methods businesses can respond to the present coronavirus pandemic, but we would suggest you be resourceful and pragmatic. For your business, this would mean being conscious and thoughtful of the real effect on your clients. Consider your significance to the situation and don’t try and force-fit your brand into the places where it does not belong.

4. Choose the perfect marketing platform

After you are prepared with a simple business strategy, you can progress towards marketing your business. These days the finest way to select a place for advertising and marketing is an “online” platform. As everybody is under house arrest, this is the best method to reach on their laptops, mobile phones, etc. and, market your business on online platforms. Presume that you are running a clothing store then you are likely to find your clients on platforms like Flipkart, Amazon, Instagram, etc. This means that your goal is clear! You just need to catalog your products on these platforms and you are all set to attract prospective customers.

5. Run ads and advertise

We all are well aware of the fact that paid ads have become cheaper and it is the best time to advertise and market your business on online platforms. You can select a paid ad campaign which will start showing result rapidly. These big ad networks display an auction system where each business has to make an effort on certain keywords. While these ad networks need small businesses to drive the CPC (cost per click) for ads from where they are earning and likewise, bigger businesses are bound to spend more money on ads.

6. Offer Help 

By offering help to your customers/clients/community/followers/, you will be able to increase your fan following and popularity. Though we know that you are losing your clients and eventually your business might be suffering. But, like many others, you should also follow the free service policy. By providing free help, you will gain a larger number of visitors and a greater number of people will get connected with you.

At present, this is the best possible online marketing plan used by companies. Though initially, it won’t be generating enough revenue, eventually, it will aid many business owners.

7. Focus on the improvement and organizational growth

Also, you must never fail to focus on improvement. We do agree that the current time might not be good for everybody but you must never lose hope and aim for regular improvement. You must aim at upgrading customer lifetime value (LTV), increase the earnings, create fresh leads for the business, etc. There are several marketing channels at hand to advance your media like newspapers, blogs, webinars, social media posts, etc. Try to reach  a maximum number of customers.

8. Nurture a healthy relationship with clients as well as with employees

This time might have been tough for several businessmen to pay off suppliers, rent vendors, during the lockdown. If you are struggling with a similar condition, then it would be best for you to communicate with your vendors and give them adequate notice if there is a hindrance in payments.

This would help them to be prepared beforehand and thus, there won’t be any bitterness in your relationship. Also, many big companies have been considering layoff as their best technique to cut down their expenses during the lockdown, especially for the higher salary head. Being a business owner even if you are planning to lay off your employees, do it with care as these are the tough calls. You can offer additional compensation, check out the government directives, etc. so that the morale of the employees remains unaffected.

Synopsis

It might not be easy for businesses to pull through and strive for business extension but precise digital marketing plans may help to a great extent. Start planning stuff, run an online business in coronavirus pandemic, find your new probable customers who are online, select the best way of online marketing strategies for your business and maximize your reach. This will surely help you target a sizeable audience, larger than the earlier times.

Mamta Sharma

0

Leave a Comment