COVID-19 Business Survival Guide

One of the most business-critical events of 2020 was undoubtedly COVID-19, which significantly affected the global economy. It also affected the way people interact, the way they live and affected most businesses around the world.

Brick and mortar stores and smaller businesses that lacked the infrastructure to move online were the most affected. In this article, we’ll delve into the tools and tips to give additional stability and automation to your business processes. These tips will not only help you and your business survive in such situations. But will also boost engagement and increase sales conversion.

Let’s take a look at some of the impacts from COVID-19:

• Majority of countries went into full lockdowns.

The COVID-19 pandemic saw a significant number of people around the world being isolated to their homes. Along with being prompted to apply social distancing in their daily activities.

• Retail attendance plummeted as shoppers stayed home.

A study conducted by Accountancy giant EY showed that 67% of individuals did not travel more than 5 kilometres from their home to go shopping. Whilst this damaged sales revenue for physical stores, it opened up new horizons for e-commerce platforms. With global revenue for online purchases coming in at $4.29 trillion for 2020.

• COVID-19 led to the closure of thousands of small businesses, some only partially whereas others have had to close permanently.

hilst this has been a sudden shock to individuals across the globe, we have to adapt to the external environment no matter how challenging it seems at the moment.

The information age has grown exponentially until this present day, several decades have passed with each new stage bringing in new technologies, new tools and new ways to use digital devices. Each decade has demonstrated intelligence and forward-thinking to bring society only the most advanced technologies known to man.

One of these highly technological tools is the 3D configurator, an innovative sales tool that allows customers the opportunity to easily configure a product with specific settings that interest them. These are settings such as color, material, the shape of the product, all whilst being in real-time, on any device.

Check out this example here.

A 3D configurator allows you to increase product awareness and interest from customers due to the close interaction and real-life modelling aspects. They have also been proven to increase conversion rate, reduce the number of product returns and increase overall brand awareness.

Discover these interesting facts!

• “Business customers are developing a strong preference for B2B self-service — especially millennials, with 44% preferring no sales rep interaction.”
• “By 2022, organizations using multiple go-to-market approaches for digital commerce will outperform non-commerce organizations by 30% in sales growth. (с) Gartner
• “Business customers are developing a strong preference for B2B self-service — especially millennials, with 44% preferring no sales rep interaction.”
• According to Gartner, “COVID-19 has propelled digital commerce to become the leading customer buying channel for many organizations. Application leaders responsible for digital commerce technologies must quickly adapt to changing customer buying habits to grow revenue and sustain market share.”
• Use of recent and emerging technologies like AR, magic mirrors, kiosks, RFID/QR enabled information screens, in-store messaging and communication will aid in improving the customers in-store and contactless shopping experience in the post-pandemic era. [https://www.ey.com/en_in/consulting/can-in-store-digital-experience-transform-the-future-of-shopping]