Marketing in the Era of Coronavirus

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There will be many times of uncertainty in every marketer’sncareer. From new competitive threats and industry shake-ups, to product shortcomingsnand internal politics, we’ve all faced or will face situations that are unfamiliarnand that can’t be resolved based solely on our experience and instinct.

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Perhaps no time of uncertainty will ever have the global reach of today’s Coronavirus pandemic. I hope not. This is beyond our wildest fears and hits us at both a personal and a business level. Everything has changed and is continuing to change. The phrase, “anything-but-normal” has popped up as a reflection of our country’s attitude. As marketers, the way we conveyed our brands yesterday simply may not be the way we need to do it today. Experience and instinct seem less important than creativity and invention.

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How we would like to help

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Yesterday, wenannounced a program to help assess your current marketing efforts. Marketingnattribution offers a unique ability here in terms of quickly gathering datanabout the effectiveness of various campaigns in terms of generatingnconversions, thus revenue, for your business. Our idea is to “plugnin” our Universal Conversion Tracking Pixel to your website, take somenreadings for a few weeks, and then summarize what we find out along with a fewnrecommendations. There’s no charge for this service… it’s totally andncompletely complimentary. We want to help using the tools we know best, and innthis time of great uncertainty, I hope this can make a difference.

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Do digital ads still work?

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We’ve also taken a look across the base of LeadsRx accountsnto see if we can glean any insights at an aggregate level that could help younin your marketing efforts. For example, we found that average daily ad clicksnon Google and Facebook are down about 27% over the weeks since March 1 comparednto the two months prior. We looked at about 100 of our customers that werenadvertising on these mediums.

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Does this mean Google and Facebook are bad investments? Notnnecessarily. Here’s an articlenposted in The New York Times that shows how “Millions of Americans arenrediscovering Facebook…” during this time of isolation and working fromnhome. A craving for current news on Coronavirus is driving users to theirnFacebook feeds, and this could mean opportunity for the right kind ofnmarketing.

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But in another articlenhere by WordStream, research found conversion rates have dropped by annaverage of 21% for paid search ads on Google. While that sounds horrible on thensurface, the research goes on to find a double-digit increase on conversionnrates for non-profits and charities.

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My point here is that it’s time to be much more analytic andnthoughtful with your marketing approach. You may have thought of Google and Facebooknas great sources of new business in the past, and your instinct has developednover the years to know just how to “tweak” the systems to get really greatnconversion rates. But today is different, and in the spirit ofn”anything-but-normal”, it’s time to let analytics guide you through thesennow turbulent times.

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Radio is still a great buy

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Here’s another interesting insight we recently found in the world of radio advertising and it’s potential effectiveness. While broadcast ads may sound “old school” to some of you, the truth is this can be an incredibly important medium to consider. Research giant Nielsen just released new data indicating that 83% of American adults are spending the same or more time with radio as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak. Their report also found that 60% of adults trust radio to give timely information about Coronavirus.

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Our own research here at LeadsRx found radio advertisersnwith a modest schedule of just 10 commercials per day are seeing a 17% increasenin visitors per spot to their website. We feel this is quite significant,nparticularly in light of the reduced ad clicks we saw on Facebook and Google. Fornsome businesses, radio listeners may be an audience you’ll want to attract asnmore and more individuals seek out timely information from trusted sources.

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Let’s all be creative

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The bottom line here is to leave pessimism and optimism behindnand to start thinking outside the box of experience and instinct. Use analyticsnas the basis of establishing a new direction and a fresh approach. Don’t viewnthe glass as half empty or half full… find a better fitting glass.

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