Humans First, Marketers Second

Covid-19 has made us realize one exceptionally important thing which has permeated all sales, marketing and commercial efforts since we…

Covid-19 has made us realize one exceptionally important thing which has permeated all sales, marketing and commercial efforts since we were initially affected by the pandemic.

We seemed to have forgotten that in marketing we needed to be humans first, marketers second. Covid-19 brought all-time high unemployment and layoffs, along with billions in lost revenue and business functions essentially grinding to a halt.

This required marketers to understand how to maintain their function and interactions with their clients in a way that was informed, sensitive, empathetic and human.

This boiled down tactically, into separating clients into two groups, one being clients in industries who were in no position to buy.

Marketing efforts to these groups consisted entirely of content focused on helping them in their own industry, providing them with tools and resources and outlets for businesses struggling during difficult times, as well as general thought leader content. This push was emulated by sales, touching base with these clients, but ensuring that the outreach was one of genuine concern and compassion with no underlying commercial motives.

We did not expect revenue from this group.

The second group were businesses who were still functioning, but with reduced capacity or perhaps just psychological strain of doing their own business during such difficult times. With these customers, across sales and marketing we were sure to maintain commercial activities and relations, however we take a hard pause and removed any touch points that seemed in-authentic or automated. This is something we were sensitive to because of the pandemic, but will be something we continue in our approach to forward looking marketing initiatives in 2020 and beyond.

The human first marketing approach is one that may have been carefully considered to a greater degree during Covid-19, but has always been, and should always be, the defacto way that we communicate with our clients.