What should your business be looking to say on social during the COVID-19 lockdowns?
Should you be saying anything at all? Should you be looking to make sales and advertise offers?
It’s difficult to know exactly what you should be doing, but for many businesses, there are still ways in which they can continue to operate, despite the restrictive conditions. And with engagement in social apps rising as people seek entertainment and distraction, it can actually be a good time to connect. If you do it right.
So what should be you sharing? Twitter recently outlined a range of key tips, which also serve as some pretty solid digital marketing pointers at anytime, even outside of the current situation.
Twitter’s four main pointers for communicating in the time of COVID-19 are:
- Inform
- Connect
- Entertain
- Help
These are the parameters around which you should be communicating – which, as noted, really relate to any other time as well, they’re just amplified in the current situation. But they serve as a prism through which to view your messaging. Does it fit into one of these categories? If it doesn’t, then leave it out, while you also need to maintain awareness of the situation, and how it’s impacting the people you’re trying to reach.
Twitter provides these examples – for ‘inform’, Twitter says that Clorox has been sharing cleaning tips, which are both relevant to its products and the current situation.
For ‘connect’, Twitter highlights Salesforce’s offer of free access to its technology to health systems affected by coronavirus, helping to support and connect with the broader community.
Salesforce is providing a COVID-19 Response Package that provides free access to technology for emergency response teams, call centers, and care management teams for health systems affected by coronavirus. Learn more: https://t.co/t3SEKK5XyS
— Salesforce (@salesforce) March 17, 2020
On ‘entertain’, Twitter praises Pinterest’s pantry-diving recipe recommendations – which, again, perfectly align with the brand, while also relating to a present need/situation.
Reply to this tweet with a photo of your pantry and we’ll respond with a recipe idea using the ingredients you already have ✨#STAYINspired
— Pinterest (@Pinterest) March 23, 2020
And on ‘Help’, Twitter points to LinkedIn’s offer of free WFH courses on LinkedIn Learning, providing assistance to the millions in suddenly changed work environments.
New to working from home? We now have a free learning path with 16 online courses that can help you create a successful remote working environment. https://t.co/ggrYkcaDuX
— LinkedIn Learning (@LI_learning) March 12, 2020
Again, these are good parameters to apply to your own communications – you want your messaging to align with these four elements, in relation to the current situation, in order to serve functional value to your audience, as opposed to blatant promotions.
Considering the present perspective is always key to implementing an effective strategy, but it’s even more pressing now, amid the coronavirus pandemic. The main notion, really, is considering how your messaging helps at this time, and what you’re offering your audience.
If it doesn’t fit into these categories, it likely doesn’t fit at all.
You can check out Twitter’s full post, with more examples, here, while Twitter has also published a COVID-19 specific crisis communications guide here.
