This deck is designed to help you navigate this difficult time, while maintaining your brand's purpose. Learn more about how to adjust your messaging and media approach in the time of COVID-19.

1. Ampersand Agency
Managing Your Brand in Crisis:
A Response to COVID-19

2. AGENDA
WHAT THIS MEANS FOR YOUR BRAND
HOW TO RESPOND
IDENTIFY YOUR CUSTOMER’S EMERGING NEED STATES
POSITIONING & MESSAGING
BRAND VOICE & TONE
MEDIA INSIGHTS & RECOMMENDATIONS

3. WHAT THIS MEANS FOR
YOUR BRAND

4. WHAT THIS MEANS FOR
YOUR BRAND
A crisis is not the time to abandon your brand’s purpose or its
promise. It’s the time to double down on what you stand for.
It’s an opportunity to prove your relevance and your worth.
Especially your trust-worthiness.
If your brand has not already established a higher-purpose, now
is not the time to try to create one, instead take stock of what it
is that you do extremely well and talk about how to amplify your
strengths in the appropriate context. Take stock of your
strengths. Know your weaknesses.
Do not make promises that you cannot keep!
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5. IDENTIFY YOUR CUSTOMER’S
EMERGING NEED STATES

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IDENTIFY YOUR CUSTOMER’S
EMERGING NEED STATES
The most valuable internal exercise you can do when thinking about how to
shift messaging in a crisis is to identify your customer’s emerging need
states. Normal priorities may have shifted. You can ask yourself these
questions:
• What are your customers’ priorities now?
• How do their needs today differ from the norm? (make a list!)
• What does the data say about how shopping patterns, items
purchased, spend and frequency of transaction say about emerging
needs?
• What are your followers saying on social media? What are your
competitors saying and doing? What is the social sentiment?
• What does recent research tell us about consumer opinion and which
brands are they celebrating and advocating in this environment?

7. HOW TO RESPOND

8. HOW TO RESPOND
Do not be silent. Several studies
have been conducted in the
past two weeks that confirm
that consumers are closely
watching how brands respond.
Silence is not golden.
It indicates that you are either
out of touch, incapable of
connecting in a meaningful
way, tone deaf, or worse—guilty
of something, like “selling”
instead of “helping.”
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9. What is the appropriate
context? It’s being relevant,
helpful, and responsive to
customer needs. What is
inappropriate? Sounding like
you are more concerned
about making money than
helping people. If you do
this right, you’ll make money
by helping people!
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HOW TO RESPOND

10. POSITIONING & MESSAGING

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POSITIONING & MESSAGING
Your positioning should not shift
dramatically—but what you
emphasize and prioritize in
messaging will.
For example, if you’re positioned as
the small, community-first brand
versus the big box provider,
enhance that position by calling out
HOW you are uniquely responding
to meet emerging community
needs, being nimble, hiring more
delivery drivers, etc.

12. BRAND VOICE & TONE

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BRAND TONE & VOICE
Your brand voice should not
dramatically change either, but it
should take on the appropriate tone
for the times.
For example, if your brand is normally
casual and carefree sounding, you’ll
want to remain positive and upbeat—
but avoid sounding out of touch or
irreverent. Knowing your audience
intimately is what helps most to
adjust your tone to better match
their sentiment.

14. SUMMARY

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SUMMARY
• Be your purpose. Express your worth as a brand that lives up to its
purpose and promises.
• Do not abandon your competitive position or try to advance a position
that has not been a fundamental part of your brand in the past.
• Examine your strengths & amplify those that can align to your purpose.
• Find the continuity and connection between what you want to
emphasize and what your brand has always been known for.
• If you have not communicated a purpose, focus on your strengths and
align them to customer needs. Doing a simple SWOT through the prism
of RELEVANCE can be the start of finding your purpose! (Remember,
it’s not a strength if it’s not relevant to the customer!)
• Maintain your brand’s identity by staying true to your brand’s DNA. If
you don’t know what makes you unique, or what is essentially in your
DNA—revisit that! We can help.

16. HOW THIS CHANGES YOUR
MEDIA APPROACH

17. MEDIA OVERVIEW
Now more than ever, online communities are crucial. People are
spending substantially more time online and they are looking to the
businesses that they know and trust to feel safe, protected and
supported.
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18. MEDIA OVERVIEW
The social media landscape has changed dramatically in the past few years.
These platforms are pay to play, and we want to ensure that all of your
content is seen by all of your core customers, as they are spending more
time online due to recent circumstances.
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19. MEDIA OVERVIEW
Organic content without paid support is not seen by the vast majority of your
fans and followers.
Your core customers are your followers, and there is no more direct and clear
way for them to engage with your brand.
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20. FOLLOWERSHIP & ONLINE
COMMUNITIES

21. FOLLOWERSHIP &
ONLINE COMMUNITIES
The good news is you’ve already started to develop an online
community, and that consists of all of your Facebook fans and
Instagram followers.
We strongly believe that these online communities are crucial to
your business at this time.
They are proven supporters of your brand and have a conscious
interest in your business.
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22. FOLLOWERSHIP &
ONLINE COMMUNITIES
We recommend shifting media spend to increase your reach and
expand communication to your followers, fans and their friends. This
will allow you to get more for your money, see substantially stronger
engagement rates and you’ll be speaking directly to your most loyal
customers who are critical at this time.
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23. AUDIENCES/ACTIVATING
CUSTOMERS

24. AUDIENCES/ACTIVATING
CUSTOMERS
From your existing Facebook fans, you can build a variety of
audiences.
The Facebook algorithm is designed to connect to 5-10 of your fans’
most engaged friends (who have likely engaged with your brand
already) which gives you access to a large number of potential fans and
customers.
This is the most cost efficient and effective way to deliver your
message at this time.
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25. AUDIENCES/ACTIVATING
CUSTOMERS
The five key components to reach these current and potential fans:
• Boosting posts so that all of your followers and fans can see your
content
• Implementing retargeting to those who have clicked on paid ads or
boosted posts
• People who have engaged with your posts (liked, commented or
shared) who aren’t fans of your page
• Creating lookalike audiences based on your followers and fans
• A follower campaign to grow your online community
The least effective means of spending in this new environment is
advertising to groups at large.
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26. POSTING
RECOMMENDATIONS

27. POSTING
RECOMMENDATIONS
During tough times, your customers want to feel consistently
supported, so you may need to increase your number of posts/
week in order to deliver effective messaging.
You will need to remind them of ways that your business can make
their routines feel normal and how you’re here to help during this
time.
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28. While your brand’s social content
categories may have previously
included things such as
promotions and lifestyle posts,
you’ll need to prioritize these
categories a bit.
You can still promote different
things (even something as simple
as “we are open!”), but consider
adding additional categories such
as community, well-being and
positive perspectives along with
highlighting products that people
need at this time.
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POSTING
RECOMMENDATIONS

29. MODERATION

30. MODERATION
It is important to acknowledge all positive comments and responses at a
time like this. Like any positive comments or respond positively back! Now is
the time to support your fans, especially within your online communities.
It is also important to address all negative comments and provide fans with
any necessary information they might need.
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31. MODERATION
Take all comments into account and pass feedback along in order to
improve operations and the overall experience at this time. For example, if
customers are requesting hand sanitizer at the registers, can we pass this
feedback along to store managers?
Rework your FAQs for moderation—audit your social pages, take into
account which questions are being asked the most, and create a new FAQ
sheet for moderation moving forward.
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32. THANK YOU!