According to the latest econsultancy.com report, on the first day of JD.com’s 618 Grand Promotion in June – a huge annual sales event for the brand – its online supermarket JD Super saw a 100% year-on-year sales increase, while fresh grocery products saw an even larger boost of 140% compared to the same day in 2019. Younger people drove a significant proportion of these online sales, with 70% of those born after 1995 now shopping for ‘necessities for the whole family’ where they were previously only buying for themselves.
This is a phenomenon seen globally. People are:
- More conservative about spending in view of uncertain job and financial prospects for the next 12-18 months
- Generally spending less on luxuries
- Spending more on staples like groceries and other essentials
- Spending more online as they are cooped up at home and local shops continue to be shuttered due to various stages of lockdown
- More likely to support local brands and locally sourced produce
According to Accenture, overall, as brick-and-mortar business activities slowed, businesses in some industries such as Investing saw up to three times their normal growth in online transaction volumes and/or revenues.
Source: https://www.accenture.com/sg-en/insights/artificial-intelligence/coronavirus-impact-singapore-digital-consumer
Some analysts predict that this may be a ‘new normal’, meaning that spending habits become permanent long after the pandemic is consigned to the annals of history books.
Therefore as marketers, regardless of B2B or B2C, how ready are you for changing buyer behaviour?
Here is a checklist for you to consider your state of “readiness”:
- If you have products, do you already have a robust ecommerce structure setup?
- If you have services, is this the time to get serious about providing your customers with web and mobile apps?
- If you have a brand, especially a consumer brand, do you have a well-thought-out media plan for the year that reaches and engages your ‘new normal’ audience?
- If you used posters, printed ads, flyers and brochures, are you replacing those with interactive and engaging content in your online properties?
- If you have always been localised and the local market demand is shrinking, are you already planning international marketing using digital, combined with international outreach programmes?
- If your store or distributed networks used to feature prominently in your income; do you have a comprehensive paid advertising strategy to replace these?
- If you are an authority on certain niches and used to be presented dominantly in events, are you now ranking high on search engine ranked pages (SERPs) to re-establish this dominance?
- If your branding was conceived in the pre-Covid era, rebranding for the Internet now becomes even more urgent; do you have a game plan?
- If your product required event appearances and an army of salesmen to present, isn’t it time to explore Youtube, Instagram and Tiktok?
- If your key spokesmen are grounded due to lockdown and travel restrictions, are you using influencers on the ground to get your message across?
- If you have been burning valuable cash, isn’t it time you explored government funding specially created to enable companies to thrive?
We hope this checklist will spark ideas and possibilities within your firm. For the how-to’s, perhaps you can contact MediaOne at enquiry@mm.com.sg or call our hotline (65) 6789 9852 for a no-obligations chat on what can be done.
We have been helping thousands of firms big and small succeed online for over a decade. I think we can definitely give you some options.
Stay Strong! Stay Safe!
Tom Koh
CEO, MediaOne
