"Life of a Marketer: During and Post Covid-19"

Is it really going to change everything? Has everything remained constant in last few years that we are so worried now?

Here is my first article, Part of a series “Life of a marketer – During and Post Covid-19”. This a small attempt from me to share my learning and thoughts which I have garnered from my experience while working with different brands, categories and startups. Hope this will trigger some interesting conversations and thoughts among fellow marketers and students.

“The only way you can stay on top is to remember to touch the bottom and get back to basics”

Shane Black

So, let’s try and break it down into pieces and start thinking of the basics

There are few basic questions that marketers have always asked and based all their decisions on.

1.      What is the product I am trying to sell and who is my consumer/user?

2.      Who is my competitor and what are they doing?

3.      What are the current needs of the users/consumers and how will they change in future?

4.      What is the RTB for my product?

5.      How do I reach my TG?

6.      What does my TG do in a day and which daypart is the best to interact with them?

7.      What are their media habits and touch points?

8.      What are my budgets?

9.      What is the marketing and media mix that I should deploy to get the best ROI?

10.  What is the right message / communication to get my TG’s attention?

11.  How do I measure the efficiency and effectiveness of the marketing plan and communication?

 Do you think any of these questions have changed now during and will change Post Covid-19?

Basics never change but we often tend to forget or ignore them. The times of crisis like Covid-19 bring back focus on the basics and it is not limited to Marketing. As marketers, we have always been looking to pick the trends or change in the ecosystem and try to make sure we modulate ourselves accordingly to stay relevant with the changing times. With the advent of internet and growth of digital we were going through a huge change anyways. We had to unlearn a lot that we had learnt over the years, felt like a student everyday with new platforms and technologies emerging but basics remained the same. As marketers, we are not facing budget cuts for the first time but the scale and pace of change is never seen before and hence it is extremely important to be nimble, vigilant and act quickly. Marketers should work hard on the following aspects to come out strong and build a sustainable business:

1. Get closer to your core segment:  With marketing budgets slashed and revenue under stress is it extremely important that marketers focus our core user segment and thus minimize the spill. Going by 80/20 principle marketers need to focus all their energies on the most valuable and engaged 20% users. Rather than going after high reach/ higher acquisition they need to focus on engagement and returns per user.

2. Data driven marketing to improve ROI: Marketers and businesses need to focus on ROI and engagement much more than ever. Data analytics and CRM tools will play an important role in analyzing different cohorts to customize messaging and product offerings accordingly.

3. Marketing mix rejig: With the change in the overall ecosystem, media habits have also seen a shift. While TV and Digital have seen massive growth, OOH (including events, on ground promotions) and print are struggling. For at least next 6-12 months, marketing will revolve around TV and digital (which includes the OTT, while they can be considered in the same category as TV - "video platforms").

4. Optimization and attribution modelling: It might sound simple and straight forward when two mediums drive the marketing mix i.e. TV and Digital, but that’s not true. With 1000’s of brands advertising on digital unlike TV wall guarded data by Big Boys of digital world, millions of websites, number of OTT platforms are making it much more complicated for marketers and media planners. Lack of transparency and data sharing among digital platforms is leading to inefficiencies in digital planning and investments. It will become more complex with increasing investments and more players moving on to digital platforms.  With heavy focus on ROI and measurement, attribution modelling will be very critical. Marketers need to spend lot of time and energy on few of these aspects:

a. Defining clear measurable success criteria and metrics

b. Track each metric by platform and overall as a medium e.g. CPA on digital broken into CPA on search (brand, competition and generic), Programmatic (View through and Click through conversions), Social(by platform), Affiliates (for each affiliate) etc. individually.

c. While TV has always been used as a medium to drive awareness and reach, the good news is (especially for the new age businesses and startups like OTT, Fintech, Edtech etc.) that it can also be used as an acquisition medium. Planned, bought and measured/ tracked basis CPA broken by channel and Time band (happy to chat in detail).

5. Be relevant: With the consumers/users becoming more cautious and conscious of how much they need to spend and what they need to buy, brands need work harder to bring out compelling story of relevance rather than just shouting “Buy me” or fighting for SOV/OTS. Spend more time on getting the right insights which will help improve the response rate and ROI.

6. Keep an eye on brand metrics: While there will be immense pressure on all the marketing teams to drive ROI in order to achieve short term business objectives, it is critical to have a close eye on brand awareness and equity metrics as “Strong Brands” come out even stronger during crisis with lesser marketing. 

I am happy to connect and have a chat on any of the points mentioned above in detail or if you have more to add (I will be happier).

Last but not the least keep reading, listening, interacting and discussing the problems you are facing with the industry experts, leaders and colleagues around you. I have been extremely fortunate to get a chance to work and interact with some of the best leaders in the industry.

I am excited to see what is in store for all of us on the other side of the tunnel - "Covid-19".

Keep yourself productive, healthy and at home!

#LifeofaMarketer #StartupIndia #Marketing #Thinkers

TK