My Top 3 Marketing “Airing of Grievances” and Reflections for 2020
Doing an airing of grievances for 2020 would be a little too much, don’t you think? Instead, here are my top 3 grievances and reflections on what it’s been like to be a marketer in 2020.
Grievance #1: Adding “now more than ever” and “unprecedented times” to marketing buzzword bingo
Every marketer knows buzzwords are the least impactful way to talk about your product or service. Yet all year every brand, whether B2B or B2C, seemed to use the same phrases in every piece of marketing copy. I’m guilty of this myself — I cringe every time I write one of these phrases — and I hope in 2021 we’ll not only be in very boring, uneventful times, but we’ll also find new ways to meaningfully and uniquely market the moment.
Reflection #1: Empathy in marketing is finally a top priority
Between a global health crisis, economic uncertainty, and a reckoning with racial inequality, companies could not afford to be tone deaf in 2020. For brands that got it right, marketers played a key role in making sure their organization led with their values and treated customers like humans. Yes, marketers have products to sell — but those companies who put people ahead of product in their marketing strategy engendered brand loyalty and created long-term bonds with customers. Nike, never one to shy away from making a statement, flipped its “Just Do It” slogan to “For Once, Don’t Do it” in an anti-racism ad. When they closed in the first lockdown, LEON, a restaurant chain in the UK, created “Feed Britain,” a platform for consumers to buy groceries directly from farmers and producers. Both companies put purpose and people front and center in their message to the market.
Grievance #2: Every company you’ve ever interacted with suddenly discovered their email distribution list
Remember March? Me neither. But I do recall the deluge of emails from every fitness studio, coffee shop, or iPhone app that ever got my email address. If these emails had said something unique, or offered a clear and relevant CTA, maybe it wouldn’t have been a big deal. But they all played the same buzzword bingo (see Grievance #1) and did nothing more than make me realize I need to stop giving out my email address.
Reflection #2: Companies that had something meaningful to offer their customers created deeper connections
On the other hand, companies that took the opportunity to provide something meaningful forged better relationships with their customers. Shameless plug — Salesforce did this well by sharing blog posts about how we’ve helped our employees in the shift to work-from-home. Fitness brands like AARMY held free Instagram classes, a great way to keep their existing customers engaged while expanding their reach. Coursera offered its “Science of Well-Being” class for free (if you haven’t taken it, it’s a highlight of 2020 for me!). Whether B2B or B2C, brands had an opportunity to add real value to customer’s lives, and those that did will continue to reap the rewards of customer loyalty in 2021.
Grievance #3: All our in person, out-of-home marketing and event plans went completely out the window
This is quite obviously a minor inconvenience in the grand scheme of 2020. This year required a big change for marketing and customer acquisition strategies that focus on in-person experiences, previously a key method to attract new customers and retain and engage existing ones. Whether you were a retail or fitness operation, or a B2B company with an events and on-site experience strategy, it all, quite obviously, needed to change, and marketing needed to change with it.
Reflection #3: The shift to digital-first provides greater scale and global reach
In a global economy, it’s sort of crazy that we never prioritized making local experiences global simply by making them digital-first, thereby reaching more people. B2B companies like Salesforce dramatically expanded the number of customers they engaged with simply by removing the barrier of being in-person. One recent customer meeting I went to had 30 attendees — something that never would have happened in-person. On the B2C side, previously local stores and consumer brands, while suffering deeply from the lack of retail foot traffic, were able to reach global markets thanks to a required shift to digital and e-commerce. Levain cookies expanded distribution and now ship across the US (you’re welcome, by the way!); Goldbelly makes it a little too easy to get your favorite local delicacies from around the country; and last week, I took a dance class with a studio in London from my living room in New York. While I hope to get back on a plane as soon as it’s safe to do so, I don’t know that I would have ventured to try new things in person like I do when those experiences are available right from home.
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In a year like 2020, it can be easy to focus on the grievances. But I hope you also take the time to reflect on what you’ve learned in 2020 in order to make 2021 unprecedented, but in a good and non-buzzwordy way. What were your grievances and, more importantly, reflections on marketing in 2020?
