5 Expert Tips to Increase Sales During the Pandemic

This is the new normal! The usual business is no longer the same. We all know that many businesses have had to make drastic changes to their strategies due to COVID-19. To manage a successful sales function, it becomes important to think differently and be adaptive to change. While some businesses may flourish with the textbook strategies, some may not. 

Here are 5 expert tips that will help you to increase your sales even during the times of COVID-19. 

Tip 1: Prioritize. Prioritize. Prioritize.

The first and most important thing is to understand where you stand as a business. If you figure that out, then the planning and strategizing become a little easier. 

In case you are already an online business, then rethink of all the strategies that are irrelevant during the pandemic. On the other hand, if you are an offline business, one of the best investments right now is to go online. Your sales will boost not just through better after-sales service but also through pre-sales activities. Putting in your money into online marketing activities is an investment but make sure to be careful where you invest it. 

These are the 2 ways to lower your costs and get maximum benefits: 

• Outsource your digital marketing work: It is only best to give this work to an external agency with professional know-how. These are the times when you do not want to make blunders with digital marketing performances. Your aim is to sustain the pandemic and boost your sales effectively. An external agency will have the current tracking, IT, and manpower to lower your burden of marketing activities. You can work in tandem with them and brief them on what you are specifically aiming at. 

• Use automation platforms: Choose competent automation platforms and technology that will help you to integrate all your marketing and sales activities, track your inventory and sales, streamline workflows, get a comprehensive view of your customers, and reduce manual labour and errors. 

Tip 2: Be available 

Your customers are busier than before during these trying times. Moreover, your competitors too are trying to sail through this time successfully so they would do anything to be in the market. All you need to do to increase your sales is to be available to your customers. You already have a customer base that you sold your products to. At this moment, you need to make sure that they find what they are looking for and under a given timeline. In case you do not have the product that your customers are looking for, then they would go to the next best choice – your competition.

This is something you do not want; so here are a few things you can work on:

• Give as much customer service as they require and possible for you

• Share video tutorials with customers to help them set up a WiFi or assemble a chair

• Make sure that you are available on all communication channels

• If they call your retail store for an exchange of a product, make sure you have it done

• Offer quick and inexpensive home delivery 

• Share comprehensive FAQs on all your communication channels so that your customers can find what they are looking for

• Set up a 24x7 customer service team

• Set up virtual meetings with your customers 

 Remember, customer loyalty is difficult to build. And it is even more difficult to keep it intact. Your sales will only rise when your customers are happy. 

Tip 3: Be considerate when selling to new customers 

COVID times are tough for everyone. It is important to be thoughtful when selling during these uncertain times. Strategies, where you send out thousands of emails and marketing communications, will have to be reconsidered. In times of pandemic, you are required to be creative and think out of the box to keep your existing customers glued to your business and prospective customers engaged. 

Here are a few things that you can do:

• Since it is difficult to understand what your prospective customer is going through mentally, personally, or professionally, it is best to reach with utmost care and concern. Once you have been helpful during the conversation, you can then proceed to discuss the current challenges that your prospective customer is facing. This is where you can tell them how your product is going to benefit them. 

• If you focus on sharing a few relevant success stories with your prospects, then you will be saving a lot of time in gaining their trust. You need to engage your prospect faster than before.

Tip 4: Rethink your marketing communications strategy

It is crucial to remove anything irrelevant or inconsistent with the existing situation. In case you have not gone through all your marketing communications, it is time that you comb through them once. Take a look at the scheduled social media posts, campaigns, emailers, and see what needs to be changed or removed. Since it is the time of social distancing, it will be nice to incorporate healthy safety measures into the current marketing strategies. 

The tone of your communication is vital. You can always change your communications when the pandemic ends, but it is important to stick to relevancy at this time.

Here are a few things that you can integrate into your communication strategy:

• Keep your messaging relevant and accurate

• Be sympathetic as a lot of your customers might be going through a hard time 

• Be hopeful and try and bring a smile to your customer’s face

• Make sure to avoid making any inappropriate humour 

Note: If you are running paid ad campaigns, make sure that you have it up to date. It is vital to keep your inventory on track and updated as well. You do not want to be running ads on the products that are irrelevant during the pandemic or are out of stock. You also might want to lower the ad budget or stop a few advertisements that are not in line with the current situation. In this way, you can save a lot. 

Tip 5: Social media influencers can help boost your sales

With more and more people going online, social media platforms are a great place to market your products. And who better than social media influencers themselves? Social media influencers marketing tactic is one of the most effective ways to connect with your target audience instantly. But first, you need to understand the psyche of your target audience and where do they spend most of their social media times on. Whether your target audience is glued to YouTube or Instagram or Facebook, you need to narrow down the social media influencers accordingly who can market your product on their account. This can help increase your sales drastically and be a new platform to market your products even after the pandemic ends. 

Final Thoughts

Whether you implement a few or all these strategies, there will always be some areas that require a different approach. All you need to do is stay focused and be flexible to incorporate newer ideas that will help boost your sales, grow your business, and keep your customers happy. We hope you are all healthy and adhering to the required safety measures!