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The economic crisis leads to the bankruptcy of some brands and brings others to popularity and success. How to make sure that your business is not going to die at the end of the economic crisis? 

Crisis is a Time of Opportunities

The approach to advertising and promotion, in general, plays a vital role in how the business will overcome obstacles. Advertising is not just «costs» or «promotion budget», it is, first of all, investment in the future. During a crisis, those are the winners who do not reduce advertising costs. After all, crises end and the consumer will simply forget about you altogether during your absence in his field of vision. Therefore, the intensity of advertising should not decrease.

Advertising is getting cheaper since many refuse promotion for this period. Low demand delivers flexible supply. Some brands take advantage of this and do not reduce their marketing activity. Over time, they get a good result compared to those who refused to proceed. Of course, you need to adjust the intensity of advertising not to overstep the line of unprofitability.

Any crisis may increase unemployment, reduce workload or lead to a quarantine. Brands have more opportunities to assert themselves as the number of people clinging to gadgets, televisions, or newspapers is overgrowing. People watch and read anything to somehow kill time. And a business can offer them quality content.

Anti-Crisis Content

To get the most out of advertising in difficult times for society, you need to make an effort to create quality content. Inviting content by itself does not work since the consumer may not be able to purchase a product or service at the moment. You need to make content that tells why your products or services are profitable to purchase.

Moreover, content should describe the positive properties of your products or services. It is necessary to build a dialogue and talk about yourself in the language of the consumer. In the long run, this will show good results.

Take advantage of the opportunities that business may have even in such difficult times, and approach the promotion in crisis conditions in an integrated manner.

The convenience of voice search among consumers forces businesses to adapt content to voice traffic. The owner of a smartphone no longer needs to google the request on the keyboard. It's more convenient to voice it in seconds and get the expected result. The voice search function is now available in smart watches and smart speakers. In the future, the list of such devices will increase. And the need for businesses to adapt content for voice traffic is becoming apparent.

Voice Traffic is No Longer a Trend But a Musthave

According to web statistics, 41% of adult Google users and 55% of teens use voice search. The fifth part of all Google requests is made via voice search. And this figure is growing fast. Experts predict that the growth of voice requests will double throughout 2020.

The rapid growth occurs due to ease of use. It eliminates the need to use a keyboard. Voice search is 3.7 times faster than text. Voice is perfect for searching from a smartphone!

The convenience of voice search triggered an increase in location and time requests. There are more and more requests like «Ok, Google. Find a vegetarian cafe by me» or «Ok, Google. What movie can I watch now at the cinema?»

Differences Between Text and Voice Content

Voice search is no longer just an advertising trick, but a convenient functionality that will, in any case, affect the promotion and content of resources. SEO optimization should now consider that voice and typing searches are different.

Voice search has changed the results algorithm. The key request has become long and conversational, it no longer looks like text request on Google.

Voice search changes the way of getting information. Artificial intelligence has transformed the search engine into a response system. The user no longer needs to browse ten different sites and select information independently. All search responses are available in fragments recommended by the system. Optimize your FAQ and Featured Snippet sections.

Developers get positive feedback that users like talking to voice assistants. Therefore, make your content as naturally as possible, do not use clericalism and the machine language format. Communicate with the user in his language!

Chrome, followed by Yandex, started automatically block annoying ads, and full-screen pop-ups are in the top of their blocking list. Numerous studies among different audiences consider this particular type of advertising the most annoying. 

How Not to Push a Consumer Away?

Brands need to be very careful when using pop-ups. Not to prevent users from consuming content, you can use alternative types of advertising. For example: 

• Contact and offer form as a part of the page;

• Skyscraper banners;

• Slider with an offer;

• Native Ad.

Native advertising is the most acceptable ad from all the abovementioned. Research has shown that it is least annoying to the consumer because it is not intrusive and aggressive. However, pop-ups may not cause an adverse reaction if you do not allow the most common mistakes.

How to Prevent Pop-Up Errors?

Check your pop-up for compliance with Coalition for Better Ads. If it violates the standards, Google Chrome will block it. If it passes the test — congratulations, you are in save!

Now you need to pay attention to the visual component. The pop-up window design has to match with the site design. Before running it, check how it looks on different gadgets. Pay particular attention to the «close» icon: it should be visible on all devices.

If the user has installed ad blocks, do not try to bypass it. It will look like disrespect and will push the client away from your services or goods. Also, do not overload the site with pop-ups. This burdens users with additional actions and will make the site inconvenient and not responding to requests.

Communication. Let the person know that the pop-up actions worked. Do not abuse long and complicated phrases. Do not cheat or manipulate. This can immediately lead to a negative result.

Privacy. If you are collecting data about the users, be sure to alert them about the processing of their data. It is essential. If the user becomes aware that you are collecting data without his consent and further using his personal information, this will undermine his trust and desire to communicate with you in the future.

Make your site user-friendly, and positive results will not keep you waiting long!

Content consumption priorities change frequently and rapidly, while consumer demand for quality content is constant. To resonate and stay in the mainstream, brands need to adapt to consumer preferences quickly. For this reason, it is essential to follow the central trends and use them as the basis for promotion. 

Mobile First

Every year, mobile traffic is becoming more and more important for business promotion. The number of mobile users is continuously growing, shifting the perspective to communication between the brand and the buyer. The primary trend that distinguishes PC and mobile users is the speed of information selection in search engines. Thus, a mobile user spends much less time searching for information on the network and prefers sites from the top lines of search engines. 

Therefore, when creating Mobile First development to promote your brand, pay special attention to SEO optimization and light-weight processes. Also, make sure to show the essential content to the end-user in the first place. Remember that mobile Internet has limitations, so users will prefer results that are optimized for their device. 

Stories for Business Promotion

Many brands continue to invest in long-playing videos tailored to the television format, and so lose consumer attention. Now a few seconds are enough for a buyer to make a choice, so the content in which the brand’s message fits in these few seconds works best. Therefore, now vertical videos for Stories on Instagram, TikTok and Facebook force out horizontal cinema formats. It is this format that has the most effective result and demonstrates the best indicators of consumer interaction with the brand.

So what kind of format is this? The Story is a popular feature on social networks that allows you to upload photos and short 15-second videos with text marks and emojis. This trend was immediately picked up by marketers, and now it's a must-have tool for promoting any goods and services. Stories have become a favourite tool of microenterprises and small business owners because they do not require extra resources, and, at the same time, show great results. Thus, Stories' availability is an excellent opportunity for Start-ups that do not have sufficient resources for promotion.

Recent studies indicate that among all social networks Instagram users most often interact with brands. The analysis of Instagram pages showed that more than half of its users are subscribed to business accounts and get the necessary brand information from the platform. Moreover, the effectiveness of “live” business accounts is so high that almost 80% of users continue to interact with the brand. 

Adaptation of advertising for smartphones or the creation of vertical content has long been an urgent challenge for companies. Follow the trends and choose the most relevant for your business!

Modern media labs use eye-tracking technology to assess user attention. This practice gives insight into what the user is interested in and to what visual and textual content they pay the most attention. 

How Native Ad Works 

According to the survey, consumers watch 53% more native advertising than direct media advertising. The number of purchases made in such advertising is 18% higher. Besides, native advertising shows 32% more shares with friends and family. For comparison, media advertising indicates only 19% shares.  

The main properties of native advertising: 

• corresponds to the identity and tone of voice of the resource,

• fits seamlessly with organic content,

• can be both a part of an advertising campaign and its independent full-fledged unit,

• coincides with the wishes of the target audience,

• does not violate the media consumption of content by the user,

• does not impose purchase or action,

• creates a positive brand image.

Native advertising is created, taking into account the strict parameters that require a platform to place it. However, it does not annoy users and looks natural. 

Native Ad Formats  

There are several formats of native advertising:

• feed or native advertising in the news feed; 

• reference ads; 

• integrated branded content on resources in the form of photos, videos, infographics, articles and others.

When creating native advertising, make sure that it corresponds to the form and image of the site for publication. When choosing a site for publication, consider its image and analytical data. Choosing a site for advertising is no less important than the quality and volume of the advertisement itself.

When creating an ad in the native format, remember that first of all it should have value and informativeness. Native advertising is a demo content, and it is not a direct and often aggressive call to buy. In this format, a close-up presentation of a product or service happens rarely. It looks like a sincere and selfless message from the brand and is perceived by the user as a friend’s advice. 

Leading web publications and marketers have long introduced native presentation formats into their Internet advertising campaigns. Use the native advertising trend to increase trust, recognition and brand loyalty.