The COVID Business Strategy: How to use COVID to your advantage in B2B business.

We all know there is no such thing as the ‘new normal’. Rip up the rule book, don’t just pivot, it's time to reinvent. The landscape has changed and so must your approach to customer experience, sales, marketing and service.

Here are the 5 steps to stay relevant and achieve success throughout COVID and beyond:

C aptivate

Reposition your messaging, services product and brand. Understand what your market needs today and wants tomorrow. Don't base your strategy on yesterday or broad brush assumptions.

Conduct primary research gain insight and inject life and relevance into your messages. Embrace compassion, wellness and express the value you will be delivering to businesses and individuals at this uncertain period.

O bjective

Redefine achievable goals - commercial, business and marketing. Define what success looks like for the new landscape. Understand business critical goals vs business aspirational goals. Reset KPI’s to enable you to gauge the impact of your efforts.

V alidate

Test your messaging on your audience, make sure it resonates. Test your marketing, your communications and the channels. Understand new user journeys and buying paths your market is exploring.

Make data lead decisions - remove the subjective and win based on fact, not fiction. Set a critical path and clear milestones to review progress. Things will change, make sure you and your strategy can too.

I mplement

Go to market fast! Embrace change! Your business must believe and commit to the new direction from your people to your on and offline communications. One clear voice requires an aligned and robust leadership team. Invest in training and development to ensure you are pulling in the same direction.

D evelop

Don’t stop there. Review success metrics, continually. Review and optimise messaging, content, channels and tactics. Don’t react, be proactive and measured. Align formal reviews against defined milestones and ensure there is enough data to make progressive decisions. Be agile and prepared to evolve, but do not change for change sake.

Summary

Your 12-month strategy and budget will not hold water in today’s ever-changing B2B landscape. Re-think the goals, budgets, teams and skills required for a post COVID landscape and get strapped in for a bumpy ride.

The game has changed, this is not a ride for the passive CMO or CEO, embrace change, it's time to roll your sleeves up and rise to the challenge.

Need support mapping your new path?

With a proven track record for research and strategy that fuels enterprise-wide; sales, marketing, brand and customer experience strategy, we will guide you and your teams to reset and redefine success.

Find out more about Project Phoenix 2.0 our exclusive B2B program designed to enable businesses to reset and build clear pathways to sustainable growth.