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Post-Pandemic Internet Marketing — Opportunities Everywhere

June 7, 2021

Wherever you live on the planet, you know firsthand how radically COVID has reshaped buying behavior. The adjustments have been difficult in many respects, but the post-pandemic environment does include many positives for online marketing.

A New Era Emerges

On the consumer side, a sure sign the pandemic experience will have long-lasting impact is the flurry of new marketing acronyms used to describe what people are doing as they shop:

  • BOPIS — Buy on-line, pick-up in-store
  • BORIS — Buy on-line, return in-store
  • ROPIS — Reserve on-line, pick-up in-store
  • ROPO — Research on-line, purchase off-line

People in all demographic categories were forced to make purchases in these ways when the lockdowns started, and guess what? A lot of us — millions — grew to like these options and are happy to continue taking advantage of the speed, flexibility, and convenience of a blended online and brick-and-mortar shopping experience.

On the B2B side, lockdowns put an end to conventions, tradeshows, live sales calls, live product demonstrations, and most other physical interactions between buyers and sellers. As with consumers, business buyers have become more reliant on — and more comfortable with — virtual meetings, video presentations of products/equipment/services, and other Internet-based purchasing and communication options.

Marketing Shift to Digital Accelerates

Although intuitively the rapidly rising popularity of the digital marketplace is easy to see, strong numbers do back up strong gut feelings:

  • According to Adobe, COVID-19 has already boosted retail e-commerce an extra $183 billion — a 20% YOY increase that is expected to continue.
  • eMarketer forecasts, not surprisingly, a 25.5% increase in U.S. digital ad spending.
  • Turning to B2B, McKinsey reports that most buyers now prefer cross-channel selling, 80% of sellers are convinced that omnichannel marketing is superior to traditional methods, and 60% of sellers plan to increase digital marketing budgets.

How Can You Capitalize on the Opportunity?

So how can you take advantage of the post-pandemic marketing environment to generate dynamic growth in online revenue and sales leads? Important strategies and tactics include these.

B2C

  • Create onsite content and site functionality to support BOPIS, BORIS, ROPIS and ROPO. This will help SEO and lay the groundwork for improving CTRs on paid search campaigns.
  • Make sure your site is fully optimized for local SEO — Most new customers start their journey on Google.
  • Expand paid search into YouTube, Facebook, and perhaps other social platforms.
  • Upgrade your website’s functionality and improve user experience, especially for e-commerce and businesses (such as restaurants) that use the BOPIS model.

B2B

  • Shift a portion of the trade show, live event, and travel budgets to online marketing.
  • Create and market persuasive and informative product/equipment videos.
  • Develop paid search campaigns with online webinars as a primary or secondary offer.
  • For SEO, optimize video and images for desktop and (very important) mobile viewing.

Need Help Developing Your Strategy?

If you’re not sure where to start, contact us here or just call toll-free 855-883-0011. We will help you evaluate your competitive situation and best online marketing options.

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