Post COVID-19 B2B Marketing: What Will Have Changed and What Won’t?

It’s crystal ball time again, this time taking a look at our present situation within this COVID-

19 crisis and pondering for a moment what “normal” will be like, as and when we get there.

In an amazingly short time, we’ve all moved from face-to-face meetings to some online

means, be it Zoom, Skype or other platform - even spending more of our time in them! Still

more amazingly, it now feels ‘normal’, as if we’ve always been doing it, even though it’s only

been since March.

Nobody knows what’s going to happen, even in a month’s time in many cases, so, please,

don’t ask me either! However, economic slow-downs and human calamities are nothing

new: it’s not a complete walk into the dark.

The forecast for this European recession is like no other before: 7.4% contraction this year -

3 percentage points more than the 2009 recession 1 and some 9 percentage points less

growth than was forecast just six months ago. Several consequences will emerge from this

over the next couple of years for B2B marketers.

Martech will transform: less used but new and more capable

The Martech market has been oversupplied by both vendors and ineffective products for

some time. Organizations have products that looked innovative but which have scarcely

raised profits.

The coming recession will reduce and transform Martech, giving it a new start. The

reduction will come from less available capital and the transformation from new martech

doing more with less.

The reasons for these two shifts of focus, given what’s happening, are:

Price drops giving strong companies in their markets the opportunity to update their martech

with more comprehensive platforms using newer, more capable technology.

The new martech will evolve from the strong flow of creativity and features. Each of the last

recessions has given birth to new names - HubSpot, Marketo, Salesforce to name but a few.

This recession will surely give birth to even more new names.

Marketing will play a greater part in creating future revenues

The most thorough research ten years ago by Harvard Business Review look at just what

recessions did to corporations’ operations. McKinzie’s research bore out the same

conclusions. Their latest research also indicates the need, in good time, to have trained

personnel that are able to help capitalize on the opportunities that arise during and after

recessions.

A smaller proportion of companies went broke (around 1 in 6). The vast majority of those

that did survive were seriously stunted by the experiences, not even returning to previous

profit levels. However, there was a small proportion (around 1 in 11) that hardly even felt the

recession, some even growing continuously throughout the periods in question and greatly

outperforming their competitors.

The key to this success was advance preparation - in particular, specific measures. They

released more cash and earlier than their competitors, allowing them to expand during the

recessions and cheaper than would normally be possible. They reduced administration

costs in time, freeing up cash for that expansion. However, so that they could expand, they

didn’t cut sales and marketing. In fact, they expanded them to promote their brands in new

markets and new locations. With the COVID-19 crisis and oncoming depression, the odds

are very much on that company leaders will look to marketing for their lead, finding new and

ingenious ways of promoting their brands to housebound customers. Digital engagement

simultaneously replacing physical shopping and maintaining profits will ensure that the C-

suite looks towards their CMOs for leading their organisations forward.

One of the tools that CMOs will need to leverage is fully implemented analytics. As we

touched on last month in this blog, analytics gives CMOs the firepower to impress on their

colleagues the positive power of marketing.

Live Events Will Still Play Their Part

People have always said that digital media will kill off live events. It hasn’t happened yet

though and it’s very unlikely to ever happen. We are still people: we like personal contact in

business, however illogical that may seem. We, marketers, are maybe the worst culprits.

9/11 wiped out foreign travel for a while. Yet, despite vastly increased security checks and

precautions now, there hasn’t been any serious dent on the long-term escalation of

travelling. More than likely, whether or not new health precautions are instituted (like

vaccination and/or infection pages in passports), international travel will restart and,

eventually, continue it previous acceleration.

Live conferences will eventually restart - again, possibly subject to vaccinations and/or clear

tests. They will restart sooner rather than later simply because of their immense ability to

push growth in markets and sales.

Most importantly, for organisations with the right formula to survive the coming depression,

there will be a different economic landscape. As already mentioned, the digital

transformation alone will ensure this. Organisations will need sales throughout this change,

whatever - and for those sales, marketing and advertising. Both marketing and advertising

are going to change - with the new, developing talent entering the jobs market and the

changing demands of customers - but the unchangeable fact is that, to attract those future

customers, organisations are going to need marketing and advertising.

If CMOs have to make cuts, they will need to look at non-profit-making parts of their

operation (e.g. yet unused programming) then, with what funds are available, invest in digital

engagement through content and paid media.

B2B marketing, over the last decade, has developed into a C-suite necessity. That isn’t

going to disappear because of the coming depression or because of COVID-19 but the

strategies we employ and those employed around us are going to change out of recognition.

What marks us out from those around us - our flexibility, ingenuity, perspicacity and

mutuality - will cement us this position in the C-suite, given we display these traits in their

best light.