The COVID-19 pandemic has forced nonprofits to adapt their marketing. While some organizations were already prepared (all things considered) – they invited remote working and had a healthy work culture long before it became a necessity to survival – others were not. In fact, they aren’t faring so well. They’re struggling to function like they did before. Unfortunately, “before” means functioning on broken business practices that exclude their employees from meaningful work, healthy working conditions and fair wages. We’re witnessing an unprecedented exposure of what capitalism has ultimately led us to. This includes COVID-19 nonprofit marketing that hasn’t reached the right target audience, has confused people and/or hasn’t provided the information people actually looking for.
If this COVID-19 pandemic should teach any nonprofit organizations and businesses anything about communications specifically, it should be these three things:
1. Value the necessity COVID-19 nonprofit marketing
Marketing and communications are tried-and-true benchmarks for the health of a business or organization. The quality of their strategies, activities and processes demonstrate their investment in their customers because the common thread among those things is effective key messaging. What I’m now seeing is nonprofits in particular scrambling to figure out how to reach their customers and (re)assure them of:
- The value they bring to the business and how much it’s appreciated
- The steps and measures being taken to ensure business is still available
- The adaptations the business is taking in response to COVID-19
Unfortunately, this is often coming after years of neglect. If we’re being honest, some organizations and businesses should have hired the right people and used the right technology a long time ago. Furthermore, they should have placed immense value on managing and retaining relationships with their key stakeholders. And now, they’re stuck tweeting into the void about business as usual. On the internal front, they’re stuck reassuring their employees about efficiency with even more Zoom/Skype meetings.
The lesson here is that no organization can stay afloat and avoid marketing and communications. With a pandemic on our hands, organizations certainly cannot avoid COVID-19 nonprofit marketing. It’s a must to maintain communication.
2. Invest in technology that encourages efficiency
I have witnessed tweets and threads on Twitter detailing how many working nonprofits are struggling to figure out Zoom, Skype, Slack and other tools that improve internal communications. Some of them are terribly funny (I shouldn’t be laughing) and others are depressing. Nonetheless, my communication senses started tingling.
Many organizations seem to have never entertained the idea of doing things differently, and it’s now costing them time, money and calm. No one is calm, understandably. However, senior-level employees seem not to know how to communicate, reassure and reignite the morale of their organization. Rather, some are insistent on implementing more micromanaging measures to compile evidence that employees are actually working, and, as expected, it’s not working.
The lesson here is to prioritize strategic communication and efficiency. Choose technology that is conducive to that as opposed to conducive to unnecessary face time. It’s like the saying goes: It could’ve been an email.
3. Appreciate all people who work for you
There have been too many horror stories of bosses requiring their employees to come back to work despite the state-of-emergency. Some employees are experiencing a sharp increase in demand or a decline in the demand for their skills.
All of these phenomena are calling to question how much value the traditional employment structure really places on people who are front-line workers, part-time workers, workers on contracts and workers with varying circumstances such as immigration status. We have been indoctrinated with the idea that the skills of these labourers were non-essential. Yet, they are the ones ensuring that the general public gets what it needs to outlive this pandemic. They are the ones being called on to create the fact sheets, tool kits, webinars, F.A.Q.s etc. to inform the general public. And they are the ones being requested to help other organizations stay afloat on the communications front.
The lesson here is that people eventually get fed up when they feel underappreciated. It’s very important to communicate to your entire team that everyone matters and you’re willing to do what it takes to ensure that doesn’t change.
Over to you
This pandemic is exposing all the ways skimping on valuable assets, people and materials comes back to bite you in the ass. There’s no returning to what was done, known or practiced before on a large-scale.
What does this all mean?
It’s now or never to adapt to the way the world actually works: with efficient communication internally and externally. It is a vital piece of any organization because it guarantees that the gears are always well-oiled and running. Too many have overlooked this fact in the name of cost-cutting, underestimation and misunderstanding. And here we (they) are.
For the sake of our lives, let’s do better.
When you’re ready to put “better” into action, contact me today.