Has Your Marketing Budget Survived COVID-19?

A recent study by Bright Talk shows over 50% of businesses have reduced their marketing budget due to a variety of reasons since the start of the coronavirus pandemic. Reasons may be sector or avatar specific, or it may simply be a case of doing what is needed to survive this uncertain period. The study also shows that many businesses have shifted their marketing activity from offline like Direct Mail to online digital marketing channels, possibly due to the perception that the latter is less expensive and perhaps easier to measure the ROI at a time when value is paramount.

In contrast, 15% of businesses have increased their marketing budgets these past two months. Again, this may be sector specific or due to the current economic climate providing a niche opportunity to exploit, or it may simply be down to the realisation that with up to 85% of the population at home there has never been a better time to reach them with clever and targeted Direct Mail. Additionally, digital marketing channels such as social media are currently overloaded with content making it more and more difficult to get your message seen there.

Royal Mail have this week extended a Direct Mail incentive to help businesses get back up to normal trading levels, and to support those that are restarting after partial or total closure. This offer encourages such businesses to use Mail as part of their marketing strategy by offering very generous credits against future postings. In the first week since launching, we have helped prepare and submit many of the 125 applications that total over 15 million items – which means physical mail is going to be a popular channel to gain people’s attention. The value cap of this offer has been extended to allow over 100 million items between now and December, so the expectation is that it is going to prove very popular indeed.