How to Create Demand in an Uncertain Time
Founder + Partner + CEO
Published Monday, March 23, 2020
There is so much uncertainty in the marketplace forcing everyone to go into “survival mode.” As a result, consumers are losing the demand for products and service - well aside from toilet paper, milk, and eggs - but that’s just doomsday prepping. Business demand is different.
For us at ScreenBroidery and in the promotional product world, traditionally there is always a demand for branded apparel/uniforms, promo pens, tote bags, and USB drives. When the economy shifts, as it has, consumers panic and fall into the black hole of “The Unknown.” They are focused on the short term because they do not know what will happen tomorrow, and haven’t started thinking of next week.
As sales reps and partners, it is our job to ease the fear of the unknown and present selling possibilities for our customers. Simple questions such as: “How are you going to reach customers? What are you doing to ease the fear of your employees? What is your competition doing? What position do you want to be in when this is over?” Once this has been done – then it’s time for the full-court press:
Get Creative.
This is a new frontier and customers are responding differently, so we are thinking differently. We create demand by selling the ideas that are currently popular. The easy pushes are to capitalize on the trends – for us at ScreenBroidery, the low hanging fruit are “Coronavirus Protection Kits.” These kits include hand sanitizers, face masks, and branded toilet paper.
Product Scarcity.
The psychology of most people is they generally want what they can’t have. Exclusivity plays on the mindset of fears and missing out – which is why all of the toilet paper is sold out across the country – not that people need it, it’s that they don’t want to miss out on it.
The hot promotional products right now are not lasting long. Our product development team is excellent at sourcing items such as hand sanitizers, face masks, and work from home kits. We source items our competition can’t – we are just better at it. When we lock in a hot item, we promote it as limited supply and drive demand.
Produce Stellar Content.
We are paying attention to the pain points in the market and creating social and email content addressing them. Our customers started working from home, so we sell work from home products. Trade shows are getting canceled, so we arm our customers with tools to reach/communicate with their customers. Because of the state of the market, we are blasting content on our products that don’t involve touching others (social distancing) - direct mail products, web store systems, and food delivery products. We are backing all of this with social posts and videos that stress the importance of these scenarios, ultimately creating demand.
In an uncertain economy, there is plenty of need. You and your team must be resourceful, and creative enough to build demand.