Critical Thinking for Students – What businesses are harmed (helped) by the pandemic?

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OK, life gives you lemons (or worse, far worse, a pandemic), how do you make lemonade. Because the pandemic is everywhere these days, we might use this current event to get students to think about the impact on various types of business. You might ask your students questions like…

  • What types of products (or companies) are likely to do particularly well (or poorly) in the pandemic? And more importantly why?

Many of their answers can be tied back to consumer behavior changing. This gives them the opportunity to see how understanding customers influences business. For more interesting examples you might share with your students, consider these articles: “Puzzles, hair dye, yeast: Companies thriving during COVID-19,” and “Early department stores were incredibly innovative. What happened?” to find less obvious examples.

  • How should companies engage in promotion during the pandemic? Why? 

Again, more examples from successful and less successful companies. See these articles about advertising “We have hit peak pandemic advertising, and now they’re just annoying,” and “Brands With Strong Twitter Personalities Stay the Course During Covid-19” (you may need to sign up to access that last one — you can get three free articles a month after signing up).

A Sales Promotion Fail…

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As businesses seek to remain relevant in the midst of our pandemic, some are getting creative and clever. Sometimes, perhaps too clever for their own good. Here are a couple of recent examples:

Actress Reese Witherspoon’s fashion line, Draper James’ marketers thought they had a great idea. The brand wanted to support teachers–who have been challenged with delivering education in a whole new format. So they decided to give teachers a free dress.

“On Thursday, April 2, Draper James announced the offer on its Instagram page, writing: “Dear Teachers: We want to say thank you. During quarantine, we see you working harder than ever to educate our children. To show our gratitude, Draper James would like to give teachers a free dress.” They were instructed to apply by a form, given a deadline, and told when “winners” would be notified — as well as that it was valid “while supplies last.”” [quote from New York Times article.]

At first, of course it got the brand a lot of great publicity (for example, both the “Today Show” and “Good Morning America” promoted it). Unfortunately, they only had 250 dresses and when 10s of thousands of teachers applied, it meant that many ended up disappointed. A promotion that started with the best of intentions came across as an example of “Celebrity #Covidwashing,” making the Draper James and Reese Witherspoon brands look bad. Read the whole story at “Reese Witherspoon’s Fashion Line Offered Free Dresses to Teachers. They Didn’t Mean Every Teacher.”

 

Advertising in a Pandemic…

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A few weeks ago we posted on a couple of articles discussing the question about how to advertise in a pandemic. This week, I thought I would share some favorite advertising that directly addresses the pandemic. It is amazing how quickly some brands (and their agencies) have created powerful ads in a short time.

Check out these ads (links to a YouTube video of the ad you can watch and show your students):

  • McDonald’s: Unskippable Ad is a handwashing reminder that runs pre-roll (before online video). While such ads are usually skippable after 5 seconds, this one cannot be skipped. It was part of a McDonald’s Russia campaign “We are for safety. With both hands.” The ad educates while also letting everyone know that McDonald’s is a safe option.
  • The Ohio Department of Health created “Flatten the Curve” to educate Ohioans (and others) the theory behind social distancing. A great example of how a short video can communicate a great deal. It is also a nice example of Marketing for a Better World (#M4BW). This simple video communicates a lot.
  • Nike: Play for the World, You Can’t Stop Us shows Nike athletes and everyday people who are still playing — though now indoors. Nike has long used its advertising to encourage us to “Just do it” or get out and play. This ad fits the times.
  • Dove has long been a leader (that link shows they have been doing it for more than 15 years!) in re-defining beauty. In a pandemic, they show some “beautiful” front-line healthcare workers in “Courage is Beautiful.” Great fit with its image. Authentic. But maybe uplifting for some of our students who are struggling with the current situation.

Marketing Communications in a Pandemic…

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What does a brand do in a pandemic? Marketing managers all over the world are trying to figure out how to manage their brand in the pandemic that is Covid-19.

This might be an interesting discussion to have in your marketing class — it is certainly timely. Here are a couple of short articles (4 minute and 7 minute reads) recently published by Fast Company that try to explain how some brands are approaching this moment–and how they are communicating with customers.

In “Why every brand you’ve ever bought something from is sending you coronavirus emails” (March 20, 2020) you can read what some brands are writing to their customers. The article notes three types of emails. Some are helpful, letting you know how its service might be changing because of the virus. The second type is the “brand friend” that maybe tries to reach out with the “we’re all in this together” type of communication. Finally, the last type is more random and makes you wonder why it was sent out. The article goes on to discuss the right way to send emails. I think you can tie this into Chapter 13’s promotion objectives and perhaps link it to a discussion of ethical communication. You might also want to talk about how to use different media (social media, email, advertising) and what might be the advantages and disadvantages of each. With brand managers struggling with this issue, it might be an interesting exercise getting your students critically thinking about it as well.

In the second article,”‘We’re all in this together’? Why brands have so little to say in the pandemic,“(March 30, 2020), the same author as the article above provides a similar categorization of advertising. With links to some of the ads, it might make an interesting topic to discuss — and then to show some of the better (and worse) examples. Nice tie to Chapter 15.

 

Marketing for a Worse World: The Case of Juul

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As you know, the new 17th edition of Essentials of Marketing and Teach the 4 Ps have been celebrating the theme, marketing for a better world (#M4BW). We are highlighting the many positive actions firms are taking to create a better world, while also making profits. That is not to say we are so naive to believe that every firm behaves in this manner. Juul’s e-cigarettes have been in the news for all the wrong reasons lately. The one getting more press is the health problems people are having. The company has also been under fire for targeting kids who are supposedly too young to use its products. This article in The Guardian, “How Juul gets kids addicted to vaping: it’s even worse than you think,” (February 14, 2020).

The example could be used with segmentation and targeting (Chapter 4), advertising (Chapter 15) or even as a counter-point to our #M4BW coverage.