Up until the COVID-19 crisis hit, you were actively determined to keep your clients and prospects up to date on your offerings and services with a regular email campaign. But what about now?? If your business has had to temporarily close or is suffering a slow-down, what on earth should you do about your email marketing??
Inform Your Audience 
The first thing your audience needs to know is – are you open? What’s happening with your business? Are you still available / able to service customers? Are your hours different? Mode of operations different? Don’t keep your customers and prospects in the dark. Be proactive, honest and informative.
If you’re operating differently because of sheltering in place, let folks know how you are serving your customers, what are their choices, how are you taking appointments, etc.
Focus on the Future
If your business has had to completely shut down for now, there’s still no need for radio silence. Travel industry experts can’t book you a vacation for today, but they can describe past tours that will someday be available again. While the future is uncertain, it doesn’t mean that we can’t ever travel again someday, so why not keep those beautiful thoughts in mind for future planning? Overall, focus on the positive, the future, and find ways to keep your audience engaged.
Invite Them To An Event
You may want to offer a free webinar or an “open office hours” Facebook live session just to answer questions and give your followers a chance to connect “live” with you. Use your email campaign to let them know the details of your virtual event and encourage registration.
When Business Is Crazy Busy
For some industries, the pace has picked up, big time. Hello accountants! These folks are now constantly on the phone fielding questions about all the financial programs out there – so this is a great time to actually step up your email marketing, to proactively answer questions your office is receiving on a daily basis. One accounting client of mine went from once a month email marketing to sometimes 3 in a month, because the information was coming in fast and furious. Email marketing actually helped their office slow down the rate of phone calls.
Service What’s Happening NOW
Ask yourself this question – what do my customers and prospects need from me RIGHT NOW? Keep your material relevant, up to date, and informative.
Adjust the frequency. If you were accustomed to weekly marketing, perhaps once or twice is more appropriate. And if you now have a fast-paced deluge of industry information, you’ll want to plan on weekly instead of monthly.
Overall Strategy
It’s all about the customers – what do they want and need? Your job is to provide them service and to continue keeping top of mind. I can’t think of a single circumstance where you should STOP marketing. Silence from you sends all the wrong messages and leads them to find someone else to fulfill their goals.
I hope this helps give you some inspiration – if you feel you are still at a loss or trapped in indecision land, please set up a free consult here and we’ll work on it together.