Global Head of Marketing at Creative Virtual, a global leader in AI-enhanced virtual agent, chatbot and live chat technology.
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Several months ago, I was part of a conversation on LinkedIn about the need for marketing to be more audience-focused than brand-focused. Immediately, a quote attributed to Theodore Roosevelt came to mind: "People don't care how much you know until they know how much you care."
That has never felt truer than this past year as marketers, companies and the world struggled to find their footing in the midst of the global pandemic. As Covid-19 lockdowns and mitigations efforts were implemented across the United States in March and April, my email inbox — and I'm guessing yours, too! — started to fill up with messages from businesses explaining their new public health protocols and telling me how much they cared about me as their customer. This sparked a flurry of commentary on social media, some of frustrated annoyance and some trying to find a little humor in the situation.
The Proof Is In The Pudding
These messages of "caring" were not all particularly well-thought-out, and some clearly missed their mark. Yet I think we should cut our fellow marketers and communications professionals a little slack. It was a very strange and unsettling time for everyone and one for which there was no reference point to guide marketing activities. Every company was under immense pressure to do the "right" thing in rapidly changing and uncertain circumstances.
Now that we are nearly a year on from those early pandemic email blasts, the proof, as they say, is in the pudding. Companies that truly care about their customers have put the words from their emails into action. They have made policy changes, embarked on new digital projects and adjusted procedures in a way that proved their commitment to those words of caring.
As we start looking toward a post-pandemic world, businesses will need to show they care by acknowledging and incorporating into future plans the impacts this global health crisis has had on customers and employees.
During the Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo 2020, EMEA in November, analysts talked about the changes they saw reflected in their current research as compared with what they saw pre-pandemic. One of my takeaways from those presentations was that "when it becomes safe for our day-to-day lives to return to a more pre-pandemic 'normal,' we will not be able to take that step as the same people we were at the beginning of 2020. We will all bring with us the experiences and knowledge we internalized" during these widespread, life-changing events.
Companies should look at this as an opportunity to accelerate forward-thinking strategies to improve their experiences and communications. The experiences your business delivers to its people, both internally and externally, will determine your success.
With that in mind, now is a good time for companies to examine these three areas:
Digital Customer Experience: The need to reduce in-person interactions placed an increased focus on digital customer experiences this past year. For many customers, the convenience and safety of digital options will likely impact how they approach post-pandemic buying decisions. They will likely compare your digital customer experience (CX) with that of your competitors' as well as companies across a range of other industries. Build on the momentum you created this year to continue to scale up digital projects, fix customer self-service flaws and take advantage of artificial intelligence (AI) and human collaboration to deliver better experiences.
Remote Employee Experience: The switch to a remote workforce was sudden and full of challenges for many organizations, and it now raises the question of whether this temporary change will become more permanent. A Gartner, Inc. poll found that post-pandemic, 48% of employees are likely to work remotely all or some of the time, compared to just 30% pre-pandemic. You must decide if remote or hybrid options will work for your company and then explore the necessary investments in systems and tools for proper employee support and communications long term.
In-Person Experience: Not every aspect of our lives could be handled digitally or remotely during the pandemic, and how you are dealing with health and safety precautions in physical locations and offices is hugely important. Take a careful look at how new policies and procedures, alterations in shift scheduling, changes in furniture and equipment layouts, etc., may be delivering unexpected benefits. While they were born out of immediate necessity, some could become more permanent changes or drive future changes to improve your workflows, remove friction from previously rigid processes and help employees better serve customers.
Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is
Even if you made a few missteps this past year, it's not too late to admit your errors and make the necessary course corrections. Showing your customers that you truly care about them, as well as about your employees and your community as a whole, means putting your money where your mouth is. Words in an email, on a website or in a mission statement mean nothing if they aren't put into practice.
Recognizing and acting on the new reality of your customers' lives and expectations is essential as you move forward into the new year and beyond. Leverage this reality to demonstrate a real caring for communities and individuals, to improve your experiences and communications, and to become a better company.
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