The Covid-19 pandemic is sparking a 1-in-100 year economic event and a potential global recession. So, how do businesses continue to remain relevant, pivot, add value and reach customers while budgets are being slashed and an end date to this pandemic is uncertain?
2020 has got most businesses thinking about how they can survive, let alone grow in these tough times.
There has never been a better time to collaborate with other brands. Businesses need to band together, cross promote and tap into collaboration marketing as a strategy. When two or more brands team up, create something and help each other grow in the process, it’s a recipe for cost effective success.
Think limited edition products, virtual events, gifts-with-purchase, digital collaborations like Spotify x Charni Nicholas’ ‘cosmic playlists,’ social media competitions, challenges or content series. Not only are you tapping into a whole new community of potential customers with clever cross-promotion, collaboration marketing also allows brands to create exciting newsworthy stories to generate media coverage, too.
The good news? 90% of the resulting collaborations on Collabosaurus do not involve cash exchange whatsoever, allowing brands to tap into collaboration marketing, without the resources or big budget. Businesses can leverage what they already have; social media communities, email lists, products, services, skills, time, venue spaces, channel promotion, publicity opportunities or resources in order to establish a win/win exchange of value.
In fact, collaboration marketing is up to 25x cheaper than digital advertising and businesses can use collaborations to halve production costs.
There lies a lot of opportunity amidst all of this current chaos and some companies have been quick to jump on the collaboration bandwagon to add value amid the pandemic. Some examples of strategic brand collaborations I’ve seen during the Covid-19 crisis include PE Nation teaming up with Divine Flow Yoga to host a live streamed yoga class. Another great example is Jimmy Brings teaming up with Office Choice to deliver not only alcohol but toilet paper during Australia’s ‘TP crisis’ donating $1 from every roll sold to UNICEF’s coronavirus appeal.
Social media usage is surging up, along with online shopping activity. Thanks to Australia’s lock-down, brands are being more and more creative with how they approach virtual experiences for their customers. For example N2 Gelato is now delivering and offering pickup locations for their ice cream – both of which weren’t available before as they focused on experiential engagement only.
In addition,The Conscious Space had a huge event planned for March which has unfortunately had to be postponed. So, the team hosted a virtual social media feature of all collaborators / speakers /exhibitors online as a teaser and marketing push to get eyeballs on those people and brands in the meantime.
Whilst it is a challenging time, it will certainly test businesses to adapt and be creative. Businesses who think outside the box, either pivoting or collaborating to add value to customers, will not only survive but thrive in this climate. There’s never been a better time to team up.
- Jess Ruhfus is the founder of tech startup Collabosaurus, a marketing platform that match-makes brands for clever collaborations & partnerships. Collabosaurus has now attracted over 6500+ brands including Porsche, ASOS, Olay & Sofitel.
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