Alright, so now you have envisioned the emergency scenarios that are most likely to impact your business. It’s now time to create a bulletproof response strategy that will leave you nothing left to do other than execute.How do you best map appropriate responses to both your business activities and disaster situations? You first anticipate which areas of business will be the most impacted, and which elements in particular. Afterwards, you tailor the marketing plan to match new initiatives.
Anticipate operational impacts
Challenges to product and service delivery abound during this crisis. If you market for B2C physical products or in the e-commerce industry, marketers must adapt their messages to reflect the on-the-ground realities while staying true to the brand’s values. Some steps to take include:
Manage your promises. Set realistic expectations about service levels, product launch dates, product availability, and so on. Consider pulling ad campaigns for products you can’t be sure you can produce and deliver.
Create capacity to address customer service volumes. Craft proactive messages to distribute via email, social media and the web to answer common questions.
Optimize the marketing budget. All organizational functions will be called on to prioritize spending. Try to avoid across-the-board cuts. Look instead for ways to drive efficiency and to reduce and/or postpone obligations that won’t bring value.
Adapt the marketing plan
The next three to six months will bring many societal changes that trickle down to the marketing plan. Use the best-, worst- and moderate-case scenarios to anticipate possible and likely changes and take alternative actions. Never forget about the power of social listening (which we will cover in our next post!) and staying abreast of your customer’s conversations so you can best service them.
My Social Biz is here to help advise, consult, strategize, and deploy whatever marketing effort or campaign you may need assistance with. We are able to provide comprehensive free one hour consultations during this time to help you identify next steps in your marketing journey.