COVID-19 (and all that represents) has overwhelmed lives and livelihoods around the world and more specifically for businesses, as it has impacted customer purchase behaviour and their customer journey. As the behaviour of your customers change (due to the COVID-19 stresses and influences), it is essential to re-examine your existing customer journey and satisfaction metrics to help your business provide the right product/service and nurture all of your prospects and current customers. Here’s how you can adapt your customer journey during times of Covid-19 lockdowns.
Re-examining your customer journey
When you create your customer journey map, you have to step into your prospect’s shoes and see all the interactions they go through before purchasing, and then after the purchase.
Since we have all experienced (and still are experiencing) Covid-19 lockdowns, people need extra information that will address their current concerns when most services are shut down. It’s time for your business or brand to show social responsibility by putting marketing efforts to sell online and offer genuine support. (Emphasis on the word “genuine”!)
Check your customer journey and find touch points where you can provide genuine support and information. In these times, it’s your relationship with your customers that matters.
Building a Relationship During Covid-19 Crisis
A relationship with your customers is one you build through repeated interactions. It is built over time online and physical touch points to nourish it.
The covid-19 crisis has changed those touch points, causing businesses to bring their customers online. It’s changing the entire customer behaviour and experience, so now you must adapt and tailor the journey to the current landscape.
Your customers are sometimes afraid or at the least, stressed as the lockdown has caused some anxiety due to the uncertainty, and for businesses they are experiencing challenges. For you to adapt your customer journey during times of Covid-19 lockdown, it must be updated in such a way that the touch points must address the anxiety and uncertainty also. Some ways to do this is to use more positive and encouraging messages or offer flexible solutions tailored to different situations that your customer goes through. These are just some examples on how to adapt your customer journey during times of Covid-19 lockdown.
Another important factor to consider is that your customers will always want genuine human connections.
Most of them haven’t seen their loved ones for a long time. They’re not only looking for connections, but they also crave comfort.
As such, the customer journey must involve more human connection and less of a ‘sales-focus’ (a way to Adapt your customer journey). It is best to have a sincere tone that is authentic and empathetic. You can do this by providing informative details which might help in lessening the anxiety due to uncertainty.
Even before the pandemic hit, this was what was missing in the customer journey in many businesses. As many of them turned to automated processes, the human touch took to the backseat.
We find ourselves in highly emotive and reactionary times, that are producing high-stress situations that previously wouldn’t have even registered a blip on the ‘stress scale’. Customers are reacting from a place of fear instead of a place of safety, thereby creating emotional memories and an environment that is lacking in trust. This impacts their loyalty to that company ultimately, so their custom may be taken elsewhere in the future.
What this requires is emotionally aware leaders to place the customer’s needs and experience as a priority and be ready to overcome their stressful reactions – which can be barriers to continued loyalty. They’ve got to keep a check on where their customers are at, what their preferences are, where their stress buttons are, and be ready to adapt as required. Flexibility is key.
Feel free to contact us if you need help with your customer journey.
