As part of our new series, ‘Marketers Playbook for 2020 Post Covid-19?,  Anurag Kumar, Chief Communications Officer, Tata Sky Limited says that the current pandemic will test marketers’ resilience and adaptability. The Covid-19 induced lockdown will eventually lift. But the threat of the pandemic is unlikely to disappear until a vaccine has been found and a significant part of the population administered with it. The timeline to achieve this could be 12 to 18 months away. Till then the threat of a second round of a widespread pandemic, a mutating virus or a repeat infection of recovered individuals will all remain. What does this mean for consumers’ psyche and what should marketers be doing as a result? Given below are ten thoughts of what marketers could look at doing. Many of these emerge from time-tested marketing theories but applied to the current context.

1. Salience Matters: It always did and now even more so. Reach your existing and prospective customers regularly through wide-reaching media, i.e., TV + Digital. Tell them how your brand can help them today. For instance, at Tata Sky, we made 10 of our paid services such as Fitness, Cooking, etc free for the month of the lockdown. And told everyone about it.

2. Make Your Product Available And Its Fulfilment Possible: When customers don’t have brands to choose from, they will buy the option which can reach them. The funnel from awareness to conversion can be collapsed dramatically. If existing ways don’t work, finding new ways to get your product to prospects will win them over. What an opportunity this is!

3. With Each Passing Week, Consumers’ Definition Of What Is Essential Is Evolving: In week 5, you want to indulge in that ice-cream, while week 1 was about a survival menu. Marketers need to understand this closely and pitch their products accordingly. So, from week 5, we are restarting our campaigns to pitch new Tata Sky connections since people who really want an upgrade in their TV viewing experience are more than ready.

4. Communicate With Authenticity And Empathy: Your communication should reflect what people are going through. On the TVC to communicate the 10 free services from Tata Sky, we got a bunch of people to shoot themselves and family members on phone cameras while learning how to cook, exercise, or dance at home. No big budget production quality, just connecting in a human way in the moment. Of course, what people are thinking evolves over the weeks, so should communication.

5. New Habits Are Taking Shape In The Lockdown: Evidence suggests that you need to follow something for 21 days consistently and then it becomes a habit. So, many new behaviours from the lockdown will stick later as well. Think about new shows on TV, online videos, digital payments, exercising at home or taking online classes. Which new behaviour can your product latch on to?

6. New Attributes Are Becoming Important: Consumer attributes around hygiene, sustainability, return to community and family to name a few, will become important. How can brands leverage and work around these. Could the fact that a Tata Sky technician visiting your home in the future will be dressed in PPEs become a source of competitive advantage? We believe so.

7. Digitise Or Perish: Businesses which have invested over time on digitisation for product fulfilment, customer service and transactions are reaping the benefits now. On Tata Sky, we have been driving adoption of the Website & Mobile App for some time and started a WhatsApp for Business journey for customer service last year. The lockdown has led to a dramatic increase in customers using WhatsApp for service requests such as managing packs and recharges. Just when our call centres had to shut, this came in handy to handle the traffic.

8. Emotionally Uplifting Customer Experiences: What can brands do to uplift customers emotionally on their digital journeys such as on Website and App? Give them confidence, make them feel valued and respected. Many grocery and food delivery apps have stepped up here, and just the few screens on the app with clear, simple and honest communication on when their deliveries would come back to capacity and what & how they can deliver is making a real difference to customers. This is a feeling which will last in customers’ minds way more than a slick TV ad. Opportunity anyone?

9. Don’t Discount, Build Pricing Power Instead: Unless your product is a life saver or life essential, this is an opportunity to build pricing power. Focus on serving customers well, make the product physically available and the brand emotionally and mentally resonant. No need to discount. Save those precious monies to help your stressed financials improve.

10. Don’t Be Profligate: This is the time to treat your company’s money as your own. While you must keep your brand salient, think of every line item on the media plan. Is it right for today, and tomorrow?

At the end of the day, the lockdown and some succeeding quarters are going to test marketers’ resilience and adaptability. The survival instinct of our primitive brain, the protection which came reciprocatively from helping the community, and adaptability to changing circumstances are what made humans survive the Darwinian logic. Time for marketers to realise that they are also human.