The answer is email. The answer is *always* email.
Hands up if your personal inbox was flooded with COVID updates from businesses that haven’t interacted with you for a good ten years? <me>
Did they share anything valuable, or was it just an excuse to pop in your box and say “we’re washing our hands thoroughly and wish to advise you that, no need to panic (um, I wasn’t), but it’s still business as usual for us!”
If you’re anything like me, that might have deterred you from sending out your own email. Perhaps it’s held you back from sending any since. Un problème, mes amis.
Email remains the most powerful communication channel to stay connected with your customers, bridge physical distances and nurture lasting relationships. And in measurable terms, it has the highest ROI of marketing activities. Even if you’re looking at email from an employer’s perspective, the value of a quality ‘send’ is immeasurable.
Humans will always have a deep need for connection
Coronavirus has forced many brands to act quickly, as entire workforces have been moved online, store fronts closed, and all brands forced to adjust their products and services and the way they business to meet this extraordinary change in circumstance. There’s no water cooler chit chat to catch up on last night’s Bachelor, and there’s limited f-2-f interaction talking fashion and Saturday night events at the till.
Which has led to people doing all sorts of weird and wonderful things online (hello, TikTok!) just to maintain connection with the outside world.
That’s because, at our core, we humans just want to be seen, and heard and held.
Self-isolation has increased our connection craving
The self-isolating, stay-at-home orders have cut a jagged line through the habitual routines we took for granted, which enabled us to connect in the daily without effort. Everyone has been affected, whether you no longer have a job or a workplace to go to (work-from-home), a restructured social life, or it could just be that you waved goodbye to your mum not knowing when you’d see her to hug her again (I am nek level, uncontrollable-excitable-lab about seeing my mum on Sunday!).
As consumers, employees, clients – what we once wanted and expected from brands is no more. Our problems have changed. Our fears have changed. Our priorities and outlook have changed.
The organisations that thrive through coronavirus (and let’s be realistic in acknowledging we’re stuck with that little bugger for a while yet), are the ones who put their ears to the wall and listen to what their community is saying.
And then they get in touch and they say it.
Right, and that’s what social media’s all about, yes?
Yes, with a bit of no.
Social media is great. And while many peeps will effectively use their social media channels to share valued updates and say the right things, you don’t ever own it, you can’t control it, and not everyone is on it. Sure, it’s a brilliant platform for building your community, but unfortunately, you’re not in control of who sees your messages or when – which means you’re up a smelly creek without a paddle if Big Z decides being stinking rich is no longer a life goal and shuts things down, taking your audience and quality relationships with it.
Cue our almighty saviour: Email.
What makes a really great email
Again, you’ll need to keep your audience front of mind when you start crafting your email copy. If you’re not confident, keep it simple and focus on providing them with value, in the now.
Flight Centre recently sent me the email I didn’t know I needed, which is what spurred on this post! They’re operating in an industry that’s experienced carnage and themselves public job losses due to the downturn in travel. And yet, they produced this gem to lighten my day and implant within my wanderlusting brain the seed of hope, that one day soon, I’ll be travelling again!
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Flight Centre’s Armchair Travel Edit is the newsletter I didn’t know I needed
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Need to peak-a-boo at a few other real-life examples to liquify your creative juices?
Check out these ‘Really Good Emails’ to give you an idea of the variety of approaches and messages you can share with your customers. So much more to say than ‘business as usual’.
Simple Dos and Don’ts of communicating through a crisis
OK, a few quick ones to keep in mind:
Don’t
add to the negative rhetoric
waste your audience’s time and test their patience with irrelevant content
keep doing what you always did
be bland (time to ditch the jargon)
succumb to vague adjectives and adverbs (fantastic, incredible, *really*).
Do
put your customer first and find new ways to provide value (what do they need now?)
be empathetic / mindful / respectful of their possible personal situation
focus on your core brand values to drive your voice, messaging and tone
get creative and experiment with ways to humanise your words and persona
communicate with purpose and positive intention (have a plan!).
Be a friendly, opaque human
Email will be the new normal for a while. Use it wisely and creatively to keep yourself relevant.
Depending on your audience, their lives might not be rosy, but they might not be carnage, either. They may not need your emails, but then there’ll be some (like me) who’ll revel in a light-hearted email calling out our new realities.
If you keep your audience at the centre of your strategy, you will find creative ways to engage with them and meet their evolving needs. Don’t be like me and ghost your list for months and then jump out and say ‘BOO!’ just this now.
Come forth from the shadows my opaque friend!