We’ve all heard the saying about going up a river without a paddle and over the past few years, we’ve all been in the same boat. No matter the river and regardless of whether or not you had paddles, everyone was fighting the current when it came to marketing and brand management during the COVID-19 pandemic.
As the world was shutting down and changing in early 2020, marketing plans and budgets did the same for many brands. According to Nielsen, advertising by Consumer Product Goods (CPG) brands declined by 21% during the height of the pandemic. This decrease gave more exposure to industries actively advertising such as pharmaceutical companies, alcohol/spirits, and service providers (ex: mechanics and lawyers).
At ArchPoint Creative, we experienced a mix of client situations. Our alcohol and spirits client strategies stayed consistent and made minimal changes to their plans and spends as consumers were more active on social platforms and looking for the perfect spirits to recreate cocktails seen on TikTok. Alternatively, some of our CPG clients pulled back on out-of-home marketing tactics and relied more on digital outreach to consumers, while others shut down marketing efforts completely as delayed supply chains caused product shortages around the globe.
For the clients that stayed the course and kept paddling, ArchPoint Creative was a co-captain in the figurative boat right with them. Our team worked in tandem with clients to stay up to date on the latest pandemic statuses worldwide, and remained aware of the cultural and societal changes that were faced during the pandemic. Brand Leaders maintained daily communication with clients and kept their eyes on the horizon for both challenges and opportunities in brand support efforts. Together, we made decisions with clients on how to keep their brand moving forward and growing.
Two years of chaos and uncertainty later, our clients that kept their paddles in the water are seeing their consumer market awareness didn’t suffer as significant of a loss if any at all while others saw double-digit growth. These clients are still paddling upstream with supply chain shortages and costs of business still rising across numerous industries, but they continue to stay active in marketing efforts in and outside of the digital space, while maintaining transparent communication with their community about the challenges they are facing.
Studies show that 72% of consumers continue to base their CPG purchase decisions on a brand’s supportive actions during pandemic. Brands who went into hibernation and are now coming out, are seeing that two years off the grid was detrimental to their brand recognition, and they will now need double or triple their pre-pandemic marketing spend to recover what was lost in order to regain the loyalty of their consumer base. Their journey up river is just beginning again, and the paddling will be even harder.
The world is always changing, as are the consumers in it. There is a lot of pressure on brands to keep up and evolve with consumers in the 2022 digital marketing space, and evolution was at an all-time high during the COVID-19 pandemic. Brands couldn’t do it alone then, and even now, they are still needing help staying the course. That’s where ArchPoint Creative comes in. None of our clients ever journey without paddles or co-captains. Our dedicated team is proficient in staying on course while continuously looking towards charting new ones to keep our clients moving forward in a thriving direction.