As I started working on the marketing and communication budget for 2021, I realised how much the pandemic and post pandemic effects are still casting a shadow of uncertainty on the economy.
Before we get into details, allow me to clarify that I belong to the old school of marketers that believes in a marketing mix made of traditional communication methods carefully paired with a resource efficient online strategy.
The clarification is needed because the more we progress in this new century — having put the first 20 years behind us — the more I notice that the new generation of marketer have been taught that social media is all you need to know in order to plan and launch a successful campaign.
As much as I understand the importance of such media, I also recognise that it is strategically wise to balance marketing and communication with initiatives outside of the usual Facebook, Instagram and TikTok.
Especially at the moment, when I am working mostly in B2B, it is hard to envision a successful effort in generating leads by merely promoting social media posts: in my mind, social media is mostly entertainment for consumers.
So, in a non-COVID time I would have probably relied on offline events, such as conferences and seminars in order to attract interest and generate new connections, but having spent 2020 attending so many online events, I now question their effectiveness.
Some of the readers might empathise with my feeling of boredom, attending endless online sessions on Zoom while keeping a Chrome window open on the second monitor to browse away on something more entertaining.
Despite the event organisers promising the stars and the moon from yet another fully online event, announcing a stellar new software able to simulate a real life event, with avatars of the visitors and ultra-engaging chat rooms, there is nothing in the virtual environment that can replace the exchange of a physical business card and a handshake to firm a deal in person.
Despite this, many of the specialised industry events that I have considered sponsoring in 2020 were charging fees very much comparable to the physical events in 2019.
This is the dilemma for every marketer at the moment: how to allocate the budget for 2021, given that virtual events are - more often than not - a fiasco?
In my mind the marketing mix for 2021 should be focused on creating a catalysing ecosystem able to attract leads and prospects based on their interests.
In simple words, in 2020 we accepted to take the risk of investing in digital events as if they were as effective as physical events, but in 2021 we should think twice before inking a sponsorship deal for an online conference, but priced like a physical event.
I am not saying that all digital events are bad. I am just
inviting marketers to be more selective in 2021 than we all were in 2020.
Hopefully events organisers will manage to find an engagement formula to make the events more exciting and effective, but for now it is safer to budget the first half of 2021 with a more diverse approach compared to 2020.
[The writer is a member of the International Press Association]
STEFANO VIRGILLI
stefano@virgilli.com
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