A boon for e-merchants and digital marketing! Not exactly, at least not for everyone and not without adapting . Here are 7 web marketing tips to apply as quickly as possible to continue your online sale in the best conditions during the COVID-19 crisis.

1- Check that the message of your current marketing campaigns is appropriate

As recommended by the main online social platforms at the start of the crisis in France, the situation involves paying attention to what we communicate on the internet and how we say it .

Start by making an inventory of all your current marketing actions . Remove ads and messages that may be offensive, considered “insensitive”, opportunistic, or just not right for the situation.

For example if you had visual advertisements with pictures of people eating at a restaurant or walking outside. These are two activities that no one is supposed to be able to afford anymore because of the confinement instructions.

On your advertisements and any corresponding landing pages, remember to replace the message and the visuals which are not or no longer suitable , or to delete them. Especially on social platforms like Facebook and Twitter, where it is very easy and quick to react negatively, which can quickly create a bad buzz .

It is not only a question of image, but also of decency: you could strike people affected by the disease or directly confronted with the risks linked to the epidemic.

2- Confirm that you are open (or closed)

Many physical stores are temporarily closed, but there are also e-commerce involved.

If you maintain your activity, clearly indicate it on your site, from the home page and ideally throughout your site , for example on a banner.

If you cannot maintain your activity, indicate it on your site explaining the reasons . For example :

• To limit the risks of contagion and protect your employees;
• Because of difficulties related to logistics and delivery;
• Lack of stocks or raw material;
• Economic risks.

Namely, if you are a trader but do not sell online yet, Cdiscount and other marketplaces offer devices and discounts to access their market place. Do not hesitate to contact us or consult our various resources to help you get started.

3- Depending on your sector, encourage the purchase

Not all business sectors have been affected in the same way by the crisis. A study carried out in France made it possible to determine the sectors which saw their traffic and their conversions increase or decrease  between January-February and March 2020:

• The mass distribution (+ 162%) and the pharmacy / parapharmacy (+ 7.9%) had a strong increase in traffic and more conversions (up to + 154%);
• The travel (-70%), the method (-52.9%), the luxury  (-55.9%) and energy  (-3.67%) are in big trouble, both in terms of traffic as conversions (almost -60% for fashion);
• The marketplaces and tech have fewer visits (-3.14%), but more conversions (+ 42%);
• The media (+ 88.01%) and the telecom (+ 9.63%) saw their traffic increase, but visitors spend less time on the site and there is less conversion.

In general, we see that traffic tends to increase, so do conversions, but the time spent on pages, page views and conversion rate decrease.

Consequently, if like the large distribution and the pharmacy / parapharmacy you sell products of first necessity in this period of pandemic, you will a priori have no particular action to undertake. Otherwise, sales will have to be encouraged .

You have to limit the friction on your site, starting by reassuring the visitor and encouraging them to buy with offers, particularly for delivery. It’s a good time to change your free delivery policy , by lowering the price of the minimum basket for example. Be careful however because at this time delivery is a sensitive subject, make sure that the delivery company has enough deliverers and that it respects safety and hygiene measures.

In short: before setting up new marketing actions, make sure that you limit friction on your site and that you encourage conversion .

4- If you are teleworking, update your Google Analytics filters

For effective web marketing, you need good means of monitoring and tracking. You are probably tracking your site performance and conversions through Google Analytics. In this case, you have surely set up filters not to count internal visits in your statistics .

These filters are found in the Google Analytics administration (at view or account level), they allow you to set the IP addresses not to be taken into account.

However, if you and your employees are teleworking, your respective IP addresses are no longer the same , unless you are using a VPN or another remote network connection system. And therefore your analytical data is distorted, especially if you have several employees who work regularly on the site.

So if you can, set up a VPN. Otherwise take the time to exclude the IP addresses of those who visit the site most often to avoid seeing artificially inflated figures, and therefore effectively measure the success of your marketing actions. To know the IP address used in your home, type “my ip” in Google, you should find it very easily.

5- Reduce your online advertising expenses

Since the start of the pandemic, there has been less research on products that are not of basic necessity. If you do not have such products, it will surely be necessary to remove your paid SEO campaigns (SEA) . Even the most profitable campaigns usually won’t work as well, or even cost you money unnecessarily. However, make sure before stopping that your products are not important to your customers.

What is unsettling is that in many industries the auction has never been so low . This is probably due to the different advertisers who have reduced the number of advertisements, or who have cut advertising budgets outright. If your business offers products or services that still meet current demand, you should closely monitor your bids and expenses. It’s time to focus on your ROAS, or Return On Ad Spent .

Jeff Snyder, creator of the Elumynt advertising tool, shares his advice:

As conversion rates, CPMs, and CPCs are changing, you may need to be more direct than usual. On the research side, if you’re using smart bidding, consider switching to manual bidding, or at least re-evaluate your cost per click to reflect current changes. On social media, you may find that you can significantly increase your reach within your best performing audiences. Be ready to change your budget, change your offers and tweak your campaigns daily

It is indeed likely that you have a much better reach on social networks, Twitter and Facebook having announced an increase in the number of daily active users (+ 23% for Twitter, + 50% for most Facebook products) – despite declining advertising results. On the other hand, if you try your hand at advertising on social networks, be careful as mentioned in point 1 to check that your advertising is suitable and that you are broadcasting it in the right places . Social advertising is risky and not necessarily suitable for everyone right now, take more precautions than for any channel.

6- Promote emailing

Email is economical AND effective . Knowing that there is nothing you can do for advertising and research, which will lead to lower expenses in SEA and SMA, you can transfer part of your budget to email campaigns. For some industries, it’s very simple: just remind your customers that if the stores are closed you continue to sell online.

Remember once again that the epidemic is not to be taken lightly, communicate only if it is appropriate and reassure your customers as much as possible . Now is not the time to put forward special COVID-19 offers…

Emails will certainly not make up for your performance losses, but if you show compassion, that you can show values ​​and instill confidence in your customers and prospects, it will bring you sooner or later.

7- Continue your SEO and content marketing efforts anyway

Your performance linked to natural referencing and your content may also be losing momentum. But unlike advertising, it is recommended to continue your SEO and content marketing efforts.

There is less research, of course, but positioning is always of paramount importance and the search engine robots will not stop crawling your sites. When the containment ends, you don’t want to lose position, do you? So avoid cutting your SEO and marketing expenses too brutally, you risk losing all the efforts made so far. Above all, by continuing your efforts, you will ensure that you return to good performance more quickly once the crisis is over .