Among their other devastating ramifications, COVID-19 and its precautions have created an extraordinary level of uncertainty that can be felt in every business and every market on the planet. Few things make such a widespread impact, but when one hits, it really gets us thinking.

As businesses and organizations work to adapt to this new and fluid environment, a primary goal is staying in touch with their audiences, adjusting their messaging to resonate in the current climate and showing their concern and compassion.

They also have to rethink their messaging delivery channels, putting emphasis on what makes the most sense now and creating a foundation for business as usual once the pandemic ends. That pursuit, we believe, will require a strong emphasis on digital outreach.

1. Stay Relevant

When a situation presents itself, analyze it. Make sure you have a good understanding of what’s going on, how it affects your business and how it affects your audience.  How will your social media presence showcase your interpretation of this event? How do you stay relevant?  In the COVID-19 situation, healthcare is in the spotlight.  To show your respect and appreciation for its front-line forces, create more content that addresses this industry. Stay up-to-date with events, such as Doctor’s Day, World Health Day and International Nurses Day. Frequently post shout-outs to healthcare workers, share inspiring stories or relevant news updates in your area.  People seek clarity during times of confusion, so it’s important to stay authentic without adding to the irrelevant noise of poorly planned social campaigns.

2. Rev Up Your Video Content

Video should already be a big part of your social strategy. Once a content marketing trend, now it’s the norm. Social media platforms are investing in improving their video capabilities because video content means higher engagement and better customer retention. Today 81 percent of businesses use video as a marketing tool – some doing it better than others.  To attract a larger audience and hold their attention, create live event videos, presentations, product demos, how-to videos, vlogs or webinars. 

3. Be a Tactful and Reliable Source

It’s always like this when it comes to sensitive issues. Especially as a business, it can be difficult to find the sweet spot when talking about touchy topics. Always refrain from exaggerating or minimizing the situation. This is trouble waiting to happen. When it comes to COVID-19, only post reliable statistics and information and cite sources. And, of course, do nothing that can be seen as take advantage of the situation. Those companies who treat people the most fairly during a crisis will be their go-tos afterward.

4. Don’t be Afraid to Entertain

Now is a great time to think of creative ways to engage with your shut-in audience. Consider providing relief to their boredom and worry with content such as shoppable posts, quizzes or polls that your audience will want to repost and share, increasing brand awareness and keeping your product or service top of mind.

Working to be strategic during times such as these can prove a useful exercise with lasting benefits.  It requires a deep look into processes and messaging, which, in good times, can become outdated or stale.

So, when planning, think of it as an opportunity for a fresh start once the worst is behind us. We’re all in this together, and we stand ready to help you however we can.

As professional communicators and marketers, we are working hard to understand what the current situation means to our clients, and how it affects their marketing and communications needs. Whether it’s for us or our clients, it’s clear that one focus must stay constant: maintaining responsible marketing and communications.

These times we’re all experiencing together offer us an opportunity to proactively manage our marketing and communications in a responsible way as well as to prepare for the positive bounce-back that we’re all looking forward to. With this in mind, we hope the following tips will help you make the most of the current marketing environment.

The Best Defense is a Good Offense

In new and threatening situations, the natural reaction tends to be reactive. Covering up. But it’s dangerous to be too reactive. First, reactions focus on the specific threat, creating instant tunnel vision. If you’re keeping your eyes open for opportunities, the last thing you want to do is hyper-focus on the one thing that you see as the problem.

Being reactive also causes stress. Instead, taking control of your destiny creates a positive stance, ready and eager for what’s next.

Familiar Territory

So much of marketing today is virtual that, on the surface, it seems like one of the least affected industries. This is partially true, but subtle changes have already happened. While it sounds counterintuitive, some industries might see more competition than before for online attention. This is especially true for email campaigns. Also, some businesses that are traditionally in-person, bricks-and-mortar only, have managed to be nimble enough to shift workers to online jobs or offer virtual versions of their traditional services. So, digital marketing and communications will continue to thrive and morph at the same time, embracing some activities and marketing needs that were once almost totally offline.

All Systems Go

The increase in virtual contact drives communication levels up, so you’ll want to remain responsive without doing everything as one-offs. That’s when your existing systems such as CRM and email marketing (hopefully connected to your CRM) play an important role. Good marketing demands engagement on your customers’ terms, so make sure to use every tool at your disposal to respond and serve as needed.

Tools of the New Trade

If you haven’t utilized webinars or podcasts before, this is a good time to start. It has always been an effective way to share your insights or demonstrate the value of your product or service with minimal commitment—and substantial opportunity for engagement—from your audience. To a certain extent, the same holds true for short videos, blogs, or the tools of public relations including media releases, by-lined articles and networking with the writers and editors.

Along with the latest business communications tools, do not overlook your social media. This is a new era of engagement that calls for the highest standard of messaging and content. 

One-to-One

Whether it’s texting, calling, video chatting, or via any other means, reaching out to your customers and clients has become more necessary than ever. You’ll realize at least two big benefits from increasing your one-on-ones: communicating what actions you’re taking these days and gaining insights and other perspectives from others. If it isn’t already part of your daily business life, being proactive in your one-on-one communications should become an essential part of it now.

We are Not Alone

If your inbox has already filled with more emails than usual from companies you’ve done business with, keep that in mind when you plan to send one of yours. Not only will it need to pass the usual gauntlet of spam filters and subject-line relevance to earn an open, the message inside will need to be different from all the others in order to resonate in a meaningful way. The correct approach is actually the same as it ever was: offer something of unique value, including the experience of doing business with you.

Take on High Road

Now is the time to be a proactive partner with your customers, clients, vendors, and others. While it’s important that you show your confidence in every interaction, there is no excuse for overreaching to the point of becoming opportunistic. If you have a product or service that you can offer for free, for instance, do it as a positive gesture and acknowledge that it’s because we’re all in this together. Your responsibility, as always, is to serve the needs of your customers or clients.

Stay Strategic

Even when business was business as usual, putting out fires was much easier than stopping long enough to focus on strategy. Try not to get sidetracked by the immediate situation. Whether it’s your messaging strategy, marketing strategy, or business strategy itself, focusing on the big picture will likely pay big dividends going forward.

Stay on Message

Your business should already have a solid messaging strategy in place, so everyone knows what to say to support your brand and its mission. There is no reason to diverge from this because of the current environment. Instead, take this opportunity to augment your messaging platform with those messages that are newly important. Everything still needs to work as a comprehensive system and stay fully aligned with your strategy.

Stay Social

Just as important as staying strategic and on message: keeping your brand active socially. Use the tools of public relations and social media to widen and deepen engagement with your audience. The media and publishers are hungrier than ever for content that can enlighten and entertain. Seek out opportunities to appear as a guest on radio and podcasts as well. As for social media, make an extra effort to engage more often and more directly with followers. Now, more than ever, going beyond posts to pursue actual dialog with your audience will increase the sense of connection—so important to any brand.

Light at the End of the Tunnel

We’ve started to notice one positive indication that life beyond the curve is going to happen. The news outlets are letting the “normal” stories inch back into the news cycle. There is light at the end of the tunnel. We just don’t know exactly how long the tunnel is.

As for us at Next-Mark, each of our clients has adjusted differently to the changes. While some are clearly focusing on their internal actions, others have actually accelerated their communications and marketing outreach. And, we’re happy to share, with have welcomed new clients who see as an important partner in developing strategic communications and marketing programs in this new era of business. If this is what the new normal looks like, then we’re feeling good about the future.

As always, we encourage you to reach out anytime. Whether you need a sounding board or you want to share some your own insights, we are here for you. 

Although a lot has changed in our past 15 years in business, some things have remained constant. Among them is our belief in the importance of core messaging. That’s why whenever we start working with a new client, we strongly encourage them to let us help create a core messaging platform before they start any other marketing initiatives. Messaging is that important, and here’s why:

The Voice
Why do we insist (or at least try to insist) on developing a core messaging platform? Because every brand, every company, every organization needs a clear voice. With an established core messaging structure, this voice is fine-tuned to help the client’s customers and prospects quickly understand the value of its products and services. Actually, the benefit is not limited to sales; staff, executives, and potential hires also win when the messaging house is put in order.

Fast Forward
Establishing core messaging virtually eliminates the tendency to return to square one on every project, wondering what to say and how to say it. Anyone in the organization can refer to the messaging guide for keywords, talking points, a positioning statement, the brand promise, and more. Target markets come into focus, and buying personas within the markets become more lifelike and easier to address.

Time and Money
And did we mention that this saves clients time and money? Every marketing project started after the messaging platform has been created will run more efficiently, whether it’s done in house or by an agency. That’s because people can cut to the chase in meetings, because they’re not getting sidetracked by confusion over messaging. Plus, marketing budgets are no longer hijacked by guesswork, because the core messaging helps spotlight the differences between good spending and bad.

Messaging Power
While the process of developing a core messaging platform requires a substantial amount of work, it is well worth the effort. In fact, we enjoy this type of project and think clients should look forward to the experience as well. They always find the process to be empowering, because it helps them see how far they’ve come, understand where they are now, and articulate where they want to go in the future.

The Takeaway
So, now you know why we grabbed Marshall McLuhan’s classic “the medium is the message” and gave it a new twist: “The Messaging is the Message.” McLuhan never meant that the message wasn’t important; he wanted us to appreciate how important the context of the message is. A core messaging platform provides both the context and the messages that spring from it—and that’s very good for any business.

Next-Mark earned two 2020 Silver ADDY Awards at AdFed of the American Advertising Federation. AdFed Suncoast is the Sarasota region’s club . These awards are especially rewarding, because they span multiple categories that directly impact our clients’ business success.

One of our many projects for Elsevier won in the Sales & Marketing category for a Product or Service Sales Promotion Campaign entitled “‘Summer of 79’” is Memorable Again.” The colorful design and themed messaging combined to deliver on the client’s project needs, and we’re happy that it also stood out for the judges.

Our other win, also for a 2020 Silver ADDY, was in the Cross Platform category for an Integrated Branded Content Campaign for another major client: Medecision. This complex campaign including videos, cube design, signage and collateral, and it was called “Innovative Targeting of Personas” Liberation.

We’d like to thank these and all of our other clients for their constant support and creative collaboration on every project we work on together.

By the way, the venue for the awards, CinéBistro in Sarasota, added another level of satisfaction for us, as Next-Mark provided the marketing and PR that launched CinéBistro when it opened. Today, it’s the top location in the company’s entire upscale dinner/movie cinema portfolio.

Looks aren’t everything: Why your website must look great AND be a conversion machine

You can drive thousands, even millions, of visitors to your site. And their jaws can drop in awe at how your homepage has filled their screen with beauty. But if only a tiny percentage of them end up becoming customers, or fans, or at least doing what you’d like them to do before going elsewhere, your site is pretty much a complete failure.

To be clear, there is nothing wrong with designing a site that looks great. It is an art and a science. And it’s far from easy. That’s because there are three essential elements to the look and feel of any good website today: branding, responsive design, and user experience. We’ll touch on each of these in detail later, and good design will certainly help the cause, but first we should talk about the ultimate goal here: conversion.

Conversion: The Website Building Analogy

When thinking about conversion, it might help to think of your website as a small business in a free-standing building with several doors. The front door is your home page. Visitors discover that your business exists, think they might have a need, and enter there. They experience your brand, interact with your receptionist, and are connected with someone who can inform them about all the different lines of business that might serve their needs. They are walking toward conversion, with your help.

The side doors, on the other hand, are your website’s landing pages. Visitors have already learned about one particular line of business and may have a shortlist of questions in hand. When they walk in this side door, they also experience your brand. But they’re not welcomed by a receptionist, they’re met by a specialist who can engage in compelling conversation immediately. In other words, there’s no sense sending them back several steps so they can enter through the front door; they’re already several steps closer toward conversion where they are.

The other side doors lead to more lines of business, just like your various landing pages should do. Visitors who arrive at one of the side doors probably don’t want the grand tour of all your business lines, at least not on their first visit. But you can certainly deepen your engagement with them after they’ve been converted to customers. This, by the way, also has to do with demand generation, which we covered in another blog entitled Demand Generation: Building Better—and more—Customers.

Okay, it’s time to return to the beauty pageant part of web design: making it look its best so that the conversion path can be as close to a red carpet experience as possible. Let’s look in a bit more detail at responsive design, branding, and user experience.

Responsive Design

The variety of screens in use today dictates the absolute necessity of using responsive design. Otherwise, the site that looks amazing on your developer’s big screen will look like a Frankensite on a smartphone—and will likely be next to impossible to navigate as well. You get responsive design by hiring developers or agency resources who would be embarrassed to build any other kind of site. Period.

Branding

All the work and thinking that has already gone into your messaging, style guidelines, logo, and other important aspects of branding need to flow naturally throughout your website, too. If you haven’t already done this “work and thinking” mentioned above, please do so now! Without it, your website is destined for mediocrity. Not a good look.

User Experience (UX)

While including solid responsive design and excellent brand thinking as you move forward, your site development or refresh project also deserves a deep look at user experience, a.k.a. UX. Thinking back to the business building analogy, this is where you stage-manage what you hope your site visitors will experience as they interact with the text, images, menus, buttons, and other elements they see—depending on which page they use to first enter your site. Whatever door they arrived at, the UX should help them find their way to where you’d like them to go. Coincidently, the way they find should lead them to, you guessed it, conversion.

Building Your Conversion Machine

Your mission is to convert visitors to paying customers, blog followers, email subscribers, first-time callers, etc. In other words, you need to compel visitors to do what you want them to do, even if that means leaving your site and never coming back. That’s just called “qualifying leads.” That’s right. In addition to being a conversion machine, your site should also work as a qualifying engine. Instead of wasting your staff’s time, along with that of your site visitors, it’s best to get your messaging and user experience so right that some visitors realize they just don’t belong there.

For those visitors you want to stay, sometimes conversions can be handled on the site itself: software trials or downloads, subscriptions, and online sales, for instance. For other types of conversions, your website simply passes visitors to your real world of sales. And, unfortunately, this can be a real black hole.

For conversions that require visitors to either fill out a contact form or call a number, you should ideally have a customer relationship management (CRM) system in place. And remember, any CRM system is only as good as the business process set up to include it in the sales or conversion workflow. Do this correctly, though, and it will work wonders for business.

Long story short, your website should be designed so that visitors can basically sell themselves on doing business with you. The progress from navigating to the point of conversion must be carefully thought out. And if the conversion includes talking with someone at your organization, make sure that the process flows naturally into the “real world” outside of the site, and that your CRM ensures that nobody falls through the cracks.

Are you ready to build or tweak that site so that it hums with new business? Now you know the essential elements for a good-looking website that thinks and works like a powerful conversion machine.

Roughly 90 percent of U.S. businesses reportedly use social media as a marketing tool. That number is a testament to the power of online outreach and the opportunities it can provide to grow sales. As we head into 2020, those opportunities no doubt will grow themselves, as technology continues to evolve at an astonishing pace and in possibly bewildering array. Following are some of the related trends we believe you can expect to see in the New Year.

1. Content Continues Its Reign . . .

. . . and high quality is expected. Remember that no one knows what you do better than you, so use that knowledge not only to inform but to assist your prospects and customers. The more content, the better, as you make it easier for search engines to find you and your relevant information.

2. Internal Communication Strengthens

Businesses will take a fresh look at an under-used weapon – their own employees – by aligning and engaging them with corporate goals and plans, using digital tools to create an atmosphere that spurs productivity, team work and mutual pursuit of excellence.

3. Brands Take a Stand

This election year is expected to see more brands weigh in on issues that impact their brand purpose and audiences, as noted in Forbes. “Research has shown that trust among government is down, and more people are looking to their workplace and brands that emulate their personality and beliefs to drive change. For brands, it’s an opportunity to demonstrate their cultural relevance.”

4. Customer Experience Drives Sales

The customer experience is predicted to become the leading brand differentiator in 2020 taking  Customer Relationship Marketing to a new level of necessity. “Consumers agree, according to a 2019 Salesforce survey. In it, 84% of respondents ranked the importance of experience at the same level as products or services.”

5. Companies Get Personal

Most leading marketers agree that 2020 is going to see an explosion in personalized marketing, reaching out to consumers tired of the generic and the irrelevant. We saw this coming, in a recent survey 90 percent of consumer participants said they would be more likely to give their business to a company that offered them a personalized experience.

6. Surveys Get Shorter, “Smarter”

Tired of tedious, and often clunky surveys, consumers will drive companies to create “micro surveys” as quick pop-ups on phones or websites if they are to succeed in information gathering in the next decade. The most sophisticated research eventually will incorporate artificial intelligence in the data collection process and lay the foundation for real-time, “conversational” marketing.

7. Going with the Pros

It’s taken awhile, but business leaders are acknowledging that digital marketing is its own animal and needs a plan and strategy. Rather, digital marketing needs to be driven by people who know what they’re doing on each and every relevant platform available – while always looking for the next.

8. Thoughtful Outreach

Now, more than ever, it’s not enough to just post on a regular schedule. Each piece of outreach should be developed to inspire conversations, establish your place in existing ones and create meaningful relationships.

We no doubt will be talking more in-depth about these and other digital trends in the New Year, as they continue to alter marketing in our ongoing digital age. Until then, we’re here to take on the task or answer any questions you might have as 2020 looms with unprecedented outreach opportunities. Wishing you continued success in the new year!

I recently spoke to the Florida Public Relations Association on “Building and Nurturing High Performance Teams.” In preparation, I polled a number of seasoned marketing communications professionals and senior executives, asking for their expertise, candor and insights into building and nurturing high-performance communications teams.

My questions were couched in the key assumption that high performance goes well beyond traditional communications skills or technical marketing acumen, as well as in acknowledgement that we’re talking about people with a lot on their plates, both professionally and personally, from unrelenting deadlines to family obligations.

Still, something this important must get done. And it’s well worth the effort – for everyone involved – as employees are inspired to do their best work and stay in place, contributing to the bottom line for overall business sustainability and success.

To build anything, however, you have to know what it should look like. And that’s what my respondents provided, with their advice culminating in 10 traits that define a high-performance communications team.

1. An Environment of Trust. Trust is the foundation for every functional team and must flow across the business continuum among peers, clients, subordinates and colleagues. Successful marketers actively guard this characteristic, as broken trust is almost impossible to restore.
2. Self-Awareness that Challenges the Status Quo. This requires staying involved without over-managing.While you need processes in place to ensure accuracy and compliance, you don’t want to become the team proofreader or a bottleneck. It’s also important to develop input sources with multiple points of view including customers, prospects, lost clients, sales team members, etc.
3. A Culture of Learning. Those who truly excel at their craft foster continuous learning, both formally and informally. Be sure to stay open minded about new technologies and new ways of doing things — and learn to do them yourself instead of deferring to the early adopters. That said, never let go of your professional past experience — your wisdom may be indispensable.
4. A Willingness to Move Beyond Labels. If someone is better than you in a particular discipline, think of them as a complement to your talents rather than a threat.Teams should be a well-rounded mix of energetic and savvy younger talent, coupled with the wisdom of tenured industry experts.
5. A Passion for Excellence. High-performing teams have a profound passion for excellence. They champion each initiative with a drive toward greatness. They neversettle for average, but strive for the next level of success. They also are self motivators. The most successful members of any team are the ones who don’t wait for the request – they’re the ones who think about the objectives and look for both new and tried-and-true ways to achieve those goals.

9. Celebration of Failures. Really? Yes. Let go of the small things and move on from mistakes. You can’t control everything, so focus on big-picture ideas to achieve team success. Don’t dwell on your shortfalls; use them as a springboard to your next level of achievement.
10. Willingness to Share Risk. Your team needs to stay on top of the plan to make sure the ball doesn’t get dropped. That’s why it’s imperative that you help them understand the strategy, not just execute on it. Teams are always more effective if they understand the “why.”
11. Sense of Humor. A shared sense of humor must be present. The demands of any profession are serious; however, there needs to be room for appropriate hilarity.Laughter is essential – if we can’t take the time to laugh, something is damaged at a basic human level.
12. Mentorship is Integral. Seek mentors outside your group and completely different than your team members for an alternative perspective. Mentor even the more experienced team members to help them stretch and move toward their career aspirations.
13. Embrace Success. Do not succumb to cynicism. Be authentic in your journey and attract the team members and business colleagues who share your values. Above all, don’t be afraid to take risks.

Here are a few direct quotes that are well worth remembering as we strive to foster performance that drives excellence.

“True professionals understand that communications is a discipline — it’s not glad-handing or a creative think tank.”

• “If you inherit a team, give yourself time to trust their insights before changing up everything.”
• “Self-awareness means keenly understanding your individual and collective strengths and weaknesses.”
• “To survive in marketing communications, you need to re-invent yourself twice a decade or more.”
• “Your failures will always have more information than your successes.”

We once engaged with a new client whose leaders were among the most enthusiastic and involved professionals we’d ever seen. They were revved up about their company’s abilities, its accomplishments and its future, and eager to tell us why. Thus, our strategic messaging sessions with them produced marketing communications gold.

Funny thing, though. Very few nuggets of that gold could be found in their existing marketing outreach. Pretty much none.

The reason was obvious. As a challenger brand in a competitive market, they had positioned themselves to align with their peers, saying what those companies said and what they thought they were expected to say. Given their success, it obviously worked. But, given that success, it was now time to step away from the crowd, showing their unique niches, abilities and personality.

This involved a new strategic plan and a strategic messaging architecture to support it. We were happy to help with the latter, creating a foundation for a cohesive image, compelling content, a strong voice in the marketplace and consistency in all interactions – with employees, prospects, customers, investors and partners.

There are various types of strategic messaging frameworks, some simple, some extremely complicated. Some plans are created internally; others rely on outside consultants for a fresh, unbiased view. All, however, should incorporate the following:

• A value statement that lays out organizational priorities and core beliefs.
• A positioning statement that puts the “why” in “why us.”
• The target audiences to be reached.
• How the organization meets those audiences’ needs, solves their problems or improves their lives.
• Primary and secondary messaging to keep the proverbial horse in front of the proverbial cart.

There are entire books written on the subject, but, simply put: Messaging can have more of an impact than almost anything else in business. When driven by strategy, it also can be a source of rejuvenation and a springboard for advancement in the marketplace.

Let us know if you’re ready to jump on that trampoline. It can be fun and exhilarating, as well as meaningful.