Utilising digital marketing and e-commerce for sustaining business operations

As we all know, the 2023 Nigerian elections top all headlines and with the presidential election slated to hold on the 25th of February. I would be speaking for some of us to say that this election holds a lot of uncertainty, being that civil unrest, travel risks, and criminality have been a trend surrounding the election According to a report published by Towntalk Solutions in November 2022, there is already a record of 554 socio-political events tied to the election.

According to a report published by Towntalk Solutions in November 2022, there is already a record of 554 socio-political events tied to the election.

COMPARING THE PERCEIVED IMPACT OF THE ELECTIONS TO THAT OF COVID-19 & THE END SARS PROTEST ON BUSINESS OPERATIONS

Let’s take a memory lane down to major crises that affected business operations in Nigeria such as Covid-19 and the End SARS protest.

Business operations shut down especially small businesses which according to business insider consist of up to 99% of businesses. Many SMEs seized to exist because they couldn’t survive the test of time, and marketing was limited to only digital. However, while some business saw their end, others saw a new wave of growth, and those that thrived were businesses that adapted to doing marketing, sales, and operations digitally.

Source: https://www.statista.com/outlook/dmo/digital-advertising/nigeria#analyst-opinion

According to Statista, “Before the pandemic, the Digital Advertising market was showing signs of a solid growth rate. However, the pandemic has accelerated digital adoption, and the effect will permanently stay, which will lead to the more robust growth of the Digital Advertising market in the following years.”

During the lockdown, an e-commerce company I worked with, Babybliss had to shut down operations and 2 physical stores. They decided to resume operations online, with the expectation that revenue would be greatly reduced. However, sales and revenue actually increased by over 10%. Babybliss achieved this by adapting to operating online, relying on only digital marketing.

The same scenario played out during the ENDSARS, but since this happened during Covid-19 and a lot of businesses already adapted to the new way of operations.

WHAT SHOULD SMALL BUSINESSES EXPECT DURING AND POST THE NIGERIAN 2023 ELECTIONS?

Perhaps you’re thinking, “Why should I concern myself with the election? All I desire is to conduct my business smoothly and provide my customers with my goods and services.” Regrettably, I must inform you that maintaining a peaceful business environment would be unfeasible if the political climate in your country is unstable. This is due to the interdependence of politics and the economy. As predicted in a report copublished by Towntalk Solutions and Business Day we are more likely to experience Clashes between political parties, Heightened Criminality, peaceful but disruptive protests, increase in insecurity post-election.

HOW CAN SMALL BUSINESSES OWNERS MARKET THEIR BUSINESSES TO ENSURE CONTINUITY AND GROWTH POST-ELECTION?

If all forecasts of increased unrest happen, how do you adapt your business to ensure continuity? While some businesses are already skilled in digital marketing because they’ve been doing it for years, others, especially a one-man business may barely know how to go about leveraging online marketing channels during this period. Find a few useful marketing tips to help you thrive during this period

1. Be Ready to Adapt: The marketing strategies you had at the beginning of the year would need some updates despite the crisis and uproar, remember that life would go on and people would adapt immediately to the situation so life in your business should also go on! if your business operates traditionally normally then this may be the right time to become intentional about your online platforms, assuming you have pre-existing social media pages, websites, etc. Take the dust off them!

2. Define your KPIs clearly: Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are used to determine the success of a marketing effort. This can include social media metrics such as page growth, likes, and engagement or other conversion metrics such as sales, number of DMs, Click Trough Rate, etc. It’s important to define which metrics are most important before you start planning because they’ll help in developing the strategy.

3. Optimize for local: To effectively reach potential customers within your local area, it’s important to focus on specific geographic regions if you offer location-specific products or services. In addition to creating informative content on your website, utilizing Google Ads that target localized keywords and audiences can be highly effective.

4. Leverage Social Media: According to Statista, as of 2022, there were a total of 32.9 million social media users in Nigeria, with or without the election social media has become the hub for business. So now that everyone would be relying on social media to get updates, you would need to have your business out there. Identify what platforms your target audience is on, and also identify what could be trending on that platform such as hashtags, make use of unique features of these platforms that helps reach more people. An example is making use of the reel feature on Instagram for a wider reach. NB You don’t need various platforms, just go with those that are important to your brand.

5. Community building and management: Now is the time to strengthen your community, let them know you are very much still in business. In addition to posting updates on a regular basis, engage with people and relevant accounts to work toward creating a community (rather than just trying to rack up followers). If your social media platforms allow live events like Twitter and Instagram, you can use that to further engage the community

6. Create helpful and useful content: Refresh your messaging, not just repeat what’s being said in the media. Instead, refocus this content around showing how your business would help in addressing some challenges that your customers may be facing in trying to make purchases.

7. Use paid media for wider social reach: A study by Statista shows that brands with less than 10k Instagram followers had an average reach of 8.4% on stories, and 26.6% on posts. So if you fall in this category, for you to reach more than 26% percent you may need to employ the use of paid media. Note that before doing this, you should have properly identified your audience, be sure to target or use keywords that are relevant at this time, have useful and quality content set out a goal, and set aside an ad budget. For more guidance on how to go about developing an effective paid marketing strategy, you can check for resources online or join the SokoSQ network, a community that teaches business owners digital marketing for free. 8. Build partnerships with external platforms, blogs, etc that share political news during this period: There are pages and platforms that people would rely on for information if there’s a budget for that.

9. Remain consistent and stay focused: This is not the time to refocus, pause, or stop marketing on social media, but rather to hone your skills and stay focused on providing informative and consistent content.

In conclusions, it’s in uncertain times like this that some businesses see the light provided they take charge of the current situation, find a key entry, devise a strategy, and stay consistent. We have seen more severe crises that have passed, this too shall pass but strive to see that your business doesn’t pass with it. Above all, please stay safe.

Adaugo is a marketing professional who excels at developing growth strategies and implementing effective brand communications to scale products for brands. She is also passionate about mentorship and has successfully mentored over 300 students in marketing through personal mentorship and organized internships by Google Developers Group -Lagos chapter and GrowthXSplendid