How to Market Your "Nonessential" Business in the Age of the COVID-19 Crisis
It’s a disservice for companies to not be marketing their businesses right now.
The obvious examples are grocery delivery services, online workout apps, continued education courses, homeschooling lesson plans… Those are the obvious businesses that are helping people right now.
But what about the “nonessential” businesses?
Most businesses today would be considered nonessential. We’re no longer a society that is based on survival.
But just because physical stores are closing for the time being, that doesn’t mean money isn’t changing hands.
Even if the stock market dips right now, it’s not like that money magically disappears. All it means is that money is being taken out of the stock market and being put into people’s bank accounts (or under their mattress, who knows).
People are still spending money. We LOVE spending money!
And right now people are at home, bored, maybe a little scared, maybe a little overwhelmed, definitely spending SIGNIFICANTLY more time online.
So how do we, as business owners, market our businesses during this difficult time? Without being a sleaze ball?
We’ve been saying it in our posts all week: You have to change your messaging right now. You may even have to change your offerings, or your offering delivery (starting a Shopify store, creating virtual classes...). And you have to change them fast, or you’ll miss out on the opportunity to get all these new eyes on your business.
Beyond that... this is the time to be focusing on Top of Funnel (TOFU) content.
What does that mean?
TOFU content refers to the articles, videos, infographics, posts, etc. that are reaching people in the awareness stage.
Our graphic above shows the 3 stages all prospects go through on their way to becoming a customer: Awareness, Evaluation, Conversion.
TOFU content is that very wide awareness section at the top. It’s how most people will first become introduced to your business, and it involves raising brand awareness and generating customer engagement with people who are not familiar with your brand.
The prospect must first become aware that there is a problem and that you or your organization have a solution for it.
This is where a Search Engine Optimized (SEO) blog can help. Or using keywords in your posts, and proper hashtags. These are great ways prospects can find your website.
The prospects entering the top of your funnel are completely unaware of your solution and, often, completely unaware of their problem.
As a result, you need content with a low barrier to entry — because at this stage, they have little to no motivation to put skin in the game (such as giving you their contact information or money).
The job of TOFU content is to grab people’s attention and spark their interest. To do that, your content typically needs to entertain, educate, and/or inspire them to learn more.
This is the time for AUDIENCE BUILDING. Like never before. You have millions more hours of eyes on screens than usual. You can be creating connections, helping people become aware of your story, your message, the value you offer.
And TOFU content is how you do that.
Here’s an assignment to get you started...
In a notebook, write in detail about who your ideal customers are (they could fit into multiple categories).
When thinking about your customer profile(s), ask yourself: What are they searching for online that could lead to me? That should direct your content creation.
For example, if you sell gardening courses, you could have prospects who want gardening courses because of food security, or to cut down on their grocery bill, or because they’re a foodie who thinks local food tastes better, or because they want a way to bond with their kids...
All of these are separate pieces of content that can be created that would meet your potential customers where they’re at.
Something else to note is that your potential customers may not even be aware that what you offer is a solution yet, so it’s helpful to address your product from different angles.
They may know they want activities for bonding with their kids but not know that gardening could be a great way to do that! So creating pieces that address 1. “Gardening for the whole family,” and 2. “Ways to have fun with your kids outdoors” (with gardening as one of the ideas), actually speak to different stages of awareness that your customer may be in. Addressing them both will help expand your audience, and give your prospects even more value.
Thinking along these lines is an excellent way to expand your offerings and change your marketing strategy, so that your business can thrive in the Age of COVID-19.
Expand your marketing strategy with the help of experts
We know how much work, and how much trial and error, goes into changing your marketing strategy.If you know that what’s happening in the world right now due to COVID-19 and social distancing is signaling you to finally take your digital marketing seriously, we’d love to work with you.