The Coronavirus pandemic has been a tragic and tough time for everybody. In South Africa, people are being told to stay at home, cigarettes and alcohol are restricted, and outdoor exercise has undergone a ban.
When the time comes, if you are currently unable, to get your business up and running, it will be essential to manage your time effectively and plan your strategic response to the lockdown. Until there comes a time where you can return your business operations to normal, if that is what you desire, to begin with, it helps to prioritise specific actions.
Boost your visibility
The internet is flooded with Covid-19 and quarantine news, opinion and speculation. To get your business back at the forefront of people’s minds, you must continue to boost your visibility, whether that is through social media, the press or optimising your content for search engines.
Producing and uploading new content to your business’s website will help you reclimb the search result ladder. If you haven’t got enough hands on deck, you could consider looking at solutions with Click Intelligence, who will organise posts for you.
Get workers’ safety right
When returning your workers to your business, their safety must be your primary concern. A large amount of your time should be dedicated to how you can follow the correct guidelines, and where possible, go even further, to protect your staff.
Many might not feel safe returning to work unless you get conditions right, and you would not be comfortable failing to do so. A safe environment will breed confidence in your group and should help productivity return to normal quickly.
Thank and reward existing customers
Once your workers are safely returned to work, you can turn your attention to your clients, customers, and stakeholders. It is likely you will have been doing so already but thank them for their patience and their courage in the current situation. If you are a business which has been continuing to operate throughout lockdown, you should take special care to thank and reward those who have been sticking by you.
You could offer a flat discount to all of your customers and clients to encourage them to return to your business. If some have been supporting you during the toughest times, find a unique way of giving back to them. Reciprocating support and loyalty will not go amiss.
Explain what you have been up to
If you have been doing good deeds throughout the pandemic, let people know. Write blog posts, send out emails and contact local and national press to inform them that you are one of the crisis’ good guys, as the public will want to reward your actions.
If you have a short term or even a long-term plan of how you are going to move forward following lockdown, then inform you stakeholders and partners, who will be eager to know your strategy.
Getting these critical parts of your response right will aid recovery and show both your consumers and your employees that you care about them. Building a positive and affirming atmosphere around your business while ensuring safety should be amongst your business priorities moving forward.
