The ever-changing and ongoing nature of marketing has been shaken up by the uncertain marketing practices during the pandemic. In the entire development of marketing, it was the first time that personal selling became a definite no, mandating direct sales and impersonal channels.
During this pandemic, the customers and now sticking to buying only the essentials to satisfy their daily needs. Customers will love if someone approaches them with a helping attitude of solving their problems with empathy. The sellers must know customer behavior, motivations, perceptions, and preferences. A good marketer should provide them with buying opportunities and help them achieve their own goals instead of involving tactical advertising and sales promotion which will not gain more customers.
The unpreparedness of sales and marketing organizations to face the reality of uncertain changes in the consumer buying patterns and evolving business models is costing them heavily. The solution is effective customer-centric marketing without an unnecessary obsession with the products.
The pandemic has made all marketers take actions like re-planning, re-branding, repositioning, rethinking, re-pricing, and reorganizing the sales channels. The only solution in this crisis is to make radical improvements or makeover in the field of marketing. The swiftness of sales and marketing teams will play a crucial role in driving appropriate results.
Personal selling has been the most suitable promotion tool for B2B sales. Attracting customers will always require a personal touch for need analysis, presentation, negotiation, deal signing, and relationship building. As coronavirus continues to spread globally, social distancing has become a mandate. Organizations feel pressure to changeover from in-person selling to a modern, high-tech, virtual selling mode during the new normal.
The COVID19 pandemic is the time to embrace other stakeholders, to unite for saving the globe from the infection. The automobile companies like Maruti, Tata Motors, Mahindra Group, and others responded to a Government appeal for producing ventilators in collaboration with medical equipment manufacturers. Also, the public sector organizations like, Defence Research & Development Organization, which did not ever indulge in marketing made an example by initiating the production of face masks.
The crisis requires responsible marketers to respond with solutions to customer problems with efficient management of challenges. Automatically, customers will ensure that their saviors remain profitable.
