Being that I am a novice business owner, I really couldn’t have picked a worse time to start a business. But hey, what’s a task without a challenge right? I know there are many businesses feeling the pressure of the second shut down in Alberta. One thing I am most grateful for is that my business is all online and remote from home.
This means, for business owners like me, who do social media for work, we can continue our daily task of trying to do business with, well… you guessed it, businesses that aren’t currently open. This is only one of the many conundrums I have come across doing business during a pandemic. The next challenge is getting in touch with the businesses that need help the most. The world has become much more digitalized with the introduction of this virus. For those brick and mortar businesses, and the ma & pa shops, this means the conversion of in-store/ paper sales to online/virtual sales. Luckily for them, they live in a world of digital natives who spend their daily lives on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest, Tumblr, Snapchat, TikTok, and the list goes on…
For the digital native entrepreneurs like me, this means the world becomes a smaller place to network and interact with entrepreneurs from all over! But what do you do if the business owners you want to meet aren’t versed in the online world? How do you connect with them to give them as good a shot as any other business with a marketing team? That’s where traditional marketing WOULD have come into play, but with only essential businesses being open, the people I want to talk to the most are not on-site AND not online yet. So here we are, writing this article about how traditional marketing would be hugely beneficial, but how the specific demographic I would like to talk to isn’t available with traditional marketing efforts. How can I reach the people I hope to help with both methods?
The Demand for change, but resistance to “New”
Everything we do now is digital and the world demands that we adapt and go where the consumers are. Universally speaking, for all businesses big or small, the world demands us to expand our horizons. Our economy, especially right now, requires businesses to think outside the box and find new and creative ways to conduct business in order to have revenue and profit. But change doesn’t come naturally to many people. I know for myself I was NOT ready at all for a new career path. But with the state of the world, many like myself were given no choice but to transition and find new ways to create income for ourselves. The same goes for non-essential businesses. Now is the time for the little guys to step up and lead the way to innovative and creative marketing and sales in the online hemisphere.
The online world has proven to be both scary, and insanely genius over the many years of its creation. Harnessing the right tools starts with the right guidance. At least in my opinion having someone teach me the ropes of social media was hugely beneficial (thanks Shaw Academy). Now I want to teach the Baby Boomer and the Silver Surfer Generations how to benefit from social media for their businesses in order to stay afloat! If you happen to know of someone who owns a small store or creates beautiful handmade pieces of work, show them this article. I am sure there will be something they read that they agree with, and I want to help kickstart their success on social media. People around the globe are connected using social media, now it’s time to connect our businesses to the world so we can generate new consumers, customers, and regenerate lost wages and sales due to COVID-19.