Preparing for disruption has been a hot topic in business for many years. Whether we were talking about digital disruption or a trade war, the discussion centred around being agile enough to quickly adapt to changes in your marketplace or your industry.
In terms of disruptions, the Covid-19 pandemic is certainly unprecedented. As it creates havoc on health systems and the global economy, there is a temptation to sit back and wait to see where the chips fall from a business investment point of view. However, RAW Marketing Managing Director, Anthony Grigson believes this is short-sighted.
“Although the size of the overall market is likely to contract during a period of global disruption, there is still an opportunity for businesses to either retain or increase their market share,” Grigson said.
“While it may be instinct to take the foot off the pedal in your B2B marketing investments, there are still plenty of reasons to continue pursuing your long-term objectives.”
With the effects of this pandemic likely to last for the foreseeable future, RAW believes sales and marketing teams can realign themselves around engaging digital and traditional marketing activities. With a strong focus on established target audiences, RAW is here to help vendors and partners adapt their strategic marketing plans to prosper inside a new reality.
A Captive/Adaptive Audience
Connection and engagement are still the cornerstone of B2B marketing campaigns, which is why events are such a popular component for RAW’s partners. With the majority of traditional events now off the calendar for the next few months, RAW Marketing Senior Account Manager Akhia Karaitiana says RAW is encouraging its clients to responsively adapt their marketing mix to remain engaged with their audience.
“I’ve been personally working with several partners and vendors on a number of events facing cancellations and postponements, and generally speaking, the conversations are very positive,” Ms Karaitiana said.
“We’re pleased to see the response is to think tactically and opportunistically to pivot activity from an event to other demand generation-geared activities. With this approach, we’re confident we will hit the program objectives.”
Without events, travel is curtailed, and even face to face meetings are becoming rarer – so prospects have a lot more time on their hands to engage with insightful content. Because B2B buying journeys are no longer linear, we know that prospects prefer to engage in their own research for major purchases – so informative content such as eDMs, white papers and articles are all valuable.
Traditional marketing activities such as direct mail and telephone conversations will still remain an important part of the B2B marketing mix. And prospects are also more available in this period to take part in a range of engaging digital events such as virtual conferences and online presentations from guest speakers.
Like you, they are focused on how their business plan will deliver the strategy, but will now need to potentially adapt with new thinking and agility. Technology providers have a unique value proposition for businesses in every industry who want to set themselves up for growth, while simultaneously driving efficiency. Whether through devices, networks, infrastructure or as-a-Service cloud offerings, there is no shortage of solutions the tech industry can offer for creating more agile and efficient businesses.
For example, many will be pondering the potential disruptions to their business if employees are required to work remotely for any period of time. This opens up considerations around the applications, devices, networks and security they’ll need to facilitate a more mobile workforce – and how they can use these new capabilities to their advantage after this crisis has subsided.
As our partners attempt to navigate a new era of uncertainty, we’re here to help them develop the adaptive and responsive marketing campaigns that will keep their current prospects engaged – while unlocking a range of new opportunities into the future.
