This Marketing Tip of the Week is going to be different. This is a public service announcement for small businesses, non-profits, event organizers, farmers markets operators, trade show organizers, chambers, SBDCs, and business associations of every description anywhere in the world.
Who am I? I am a small business owner (service business) in Seattle. I support small businesses with their marketing. I also support some event clients in running their events. Seattle is one of the first cities in the US to see a big response to COVID-19. It has been a test city in illustrating how the preparation and concern around this virus would play out in our country.
Brace yourself. This is a long post. My hope is to help YOU be prepared to protect your business and revenue at this very sensitive time. For those who coach or work with a lot of small businesses, my goal is to give you tips, examples, and resources to help you prepare your clients or members.
This post is broken into the following sections:
- What Response Have We Seen for Small Businesses and Non-profits in Seattle?
- Take a Good Look at Your Budget and Operations
- Begin to Educate Your Customers and Community
- Prepare Your Crisis Communications Policies
- Seriously Think About Your Refund Policy
- Find Creative Ways to Keep the Cash Coming In
- Service Businesses
- Farmers Markets, Trade Shows, and Collectives
- Additional Resources (if you scroll to the bottom, you will see some additional resources I’ve found. I encourage you to also share additional resources in the comments)
- ONE-PAGE CHECKLIST (scroll to the bottom to download this and get prepared for your business)
Lastly, before I dive in, I want to help however much I can and be a conduit for ideas. Email me directly here if you want to tell me about a way that your business is currently coping with this. Or Email me directly here if you want to tell me – BRIEFLY – your situation and have me share examples/ideas I’ve heard about for your industry. I’ll do my best to support. If I get enough ideas, I may turn them into another blog.
Now…read on!
What Response Have We Seen for Small Business and Non-profits in Seattle?
The type of response we’ve seen is the reason why I am taking to a blog to give in-depth information. Because the response has been extremely concerning for Seattle’s economy.
I am drafting this on March 14. I am looking right now at the latest update from King County Public Health (Seattle is in King County) from March 14, which shows 388 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 35 deaths. We know that testing is lagging. For the sake of putting a number out there, let’s guess that the actual number of cases of COVID-19 is 100x higher than what has been confirmed as of this date. Okay. Let’s say 3,888.
On March 12, Governor Jay Inslee announced a ban on all events and public gatherings of 250+ people. The next day, employers began letting go of hourly workers (catering staff at venues, customer service roles, tourism industry workers, restaurant employees, and so many others). Of just two companies that I know of, that accounts for 1,300 people who were let go and filed for unemployment. So, what would THAT number look like if we were to calculate it now. The numbers on this are skyrocketing daily, and I don’t even know where to find a current number. Let’s give a conservative estimate that many tens of thousands of people lost their jobs in the last week.
That’s hourly workers. But you know who else is feeling this?
Most small businesses. People are social distancing. They are spending less. They don’t know what they can afford to spend. People are pressuring and bullying small businesses to shut their doors if they have a physical location, in many cases. (UPDATE as of March 15, bars, restaurants, and gyms have now been told to close, and we can’t assemble in groups of 50+). Cash flow matters for small businesses, and many of them are sitting in a space of negative cash flow right now. Then they lay off their team and their contractors. And they don’t hire service businesses to support them. The wave gets bigger and bigger.
Most non-profits. March-May is a major non-profit fundraiser season in Seattle. Events have been outright cancelled. A few brave non-profits are trying to reschedule to an already-packed fall fundraiser season. Many are transitioning their events online, trying to entirely replan their events in a matter of weeks or days. In this article (READ HERE) from the National Council of Nonprofits, we learn that “the majority of nonprofits…[have] less than three months of operating reserves on hand. And close to 10% [have] less than 30 days on hand.” That’s with the revenue they projected to come in right now from their fundraisers. Many of those people suggesting that non-profits cancel or postpone are unaware that what they are actually doing is telling those non-profits to shut their doors permanently.
Annual conferences and conventions. They are cancelling in droves, and the pressures they are facing are hard to watch. They have already sunk their costs and yet are being inundated and often harassed for refund requests. I have a lot to say about this below.
Organizations that make a lot /all of their revenue from frequent, smaller events. They are dealing with many of the same challenges as the other event-based businesses above, with no option to postpone to recover this lost revenue. So, those who can try to transition to online meeting/event platforms, or they just swallow the fact that they are about to lose 1/12 (?) or maybe 1/6 (?) or maybe more of their revenue.
Farmers markets or other spaces where vendors gather. On March 13, the City of Seattle suspended all permitted events, including farmers markets. So, what happens to the vendor fees for the farmers markets? And while some businesses that sell at these events also have an online presence with an ecommerce platform and some may have a physical location, a lot of them don’t and rely on the farmers markets to assemble their customers. So, when those venues go away, their sales go, too.
These are some examples of what businesses are dealing with. On the flip side of this, the response of the people is visceral. “DO THE RIGHT THING!” has become an expletive here. Community members demand that even the smaller public events, business locations, and meeting spots shut down. They are vocal. They express their disgust with those businesses that haven’t shuttered their doors. They connect it with irresponsibility. I have made it a mission to advocate for small businesses on my personal social media feed and explain what they are actually facing. I’m hoping that I’ve had some role in making even a few people take the plight a little more seriously or at least treat it with more kindness.
We had a lag of at least a week before I started seeing anyone talk about economic impact in Seattle in my social media feed. The core message being distributed was the focus on shutting everything down to prevent the spread of the virus. People were – at the same time – flippant about the economic impact if they referred to it at all. “It’s only going to be 2-3 weeks,” they would say, at first. “Could the bottom line possibly be that important?” they would ask. “That pilates class will be there in a couple of months. Do the right thing!” they would insist.
We are…slowly…starting to see people realize how drastic the economic impacts are going to be and how many knock on impacts there will be that we can’t even imagine yet, but this messaging is coming too late. We’ve already seen many thousands of workers laid off. We’ve seen permanent closures of businesses – especially restaurants – starting to be announced only a couple of weeks in. Small businesses, non-profits, and event organizers are on the front lines of feeling how hard this impact is going to hit.
In Seattle, even as the city now begins to release information about small business recovery measures they are taking, they are only serving particular segments of our small business community. The small business recovery task force that was set up is mostly occupied by brick and mortar or restaurant businesses and downtown association entities, with no official representation from service businesses and gig businesses. The result? Most of the measures and funds currently being set up are only taking into account businesses with permanent physical locations. We’re having to move quickly, and we’re overlooking a lot in the process.
Here’s what I’m saying: We could be holding these messages side by side. Prevent the spread of COVID-19 AND prevent the destruction of your local economy in every way you can.
But we haven’t been holding them side by side in Seattle. We’ve been asking to solve one problem in ways that cause the exponential and far faster-spreading breakdown of the other. If you’re a full-time employee and your employer is letting you work from home, and you’re financially okay, it’s hard to understand that for a lot of us the economic impact is what is keeping us up at night starting yesterday.
I want everyone to care that our local economies are tanking. But I don’t know if they will right now. So, it’s on all of us as small businesses, non-profits, event organizers, farmers markets, and business associations of all natures to start to figure out how to get further in front of this.
Even being prepared economically a few days earlier than we were in Seattle could make a big difference for your community.
What should businesses in your area be considering right now to get prepared? (Scroll down to the bottom of this blog to download a one-page checklist or click here to snap directly to it).
Take a Good Look at Your Budget and Operations
Start here. Look at the expenses in your budget. Identify the levers you have that you can pull in different scenarios. Look at your revenue. What do you need to protect the most? How can you make sure you are locking it in and re-locking it in regularly?
I’m not a budget expert, and I don’t have a lot to say about this subject here. But if you have a small business, there are a LOT of resources out there for you. Click here to read this blog about “Organizations That Exist to Serve Small Businesses.” There are SBDCs, SCORE locations, chambers, BIAs, and so many other organizations worldwide that can help you or help you find people who can help you.
If you operate a non-profit, click here to read this resource from The Ostara Group in Seattle about “Navigating Your Fundraising Season Amid the COVID-19 Outbreak” for some ideas, and look to the non-profit consultants and fellow non-profits in your area to see what community resources are being made available specific to your location.
Also….think about what would happen operationally in your business if you got this virus. Plan ahead now for how your business will go on if you get sick for a couple weeks. It never hurts to have these systems in place, whether or not you get sick.
Begin to Educate Your Customers and Community
Don’t wait until fear and panic has already spread into your area. Start adding little messages into your communications right now to prep them to be supportive to you. To not forget about you.
This could look like doing a Facebook post or email that starts simply with, “As we watch how other small businesses around the country are being impacted by COVID-19 and loss of support to their businesses, we can’t help but feel so thankful for all of you. It is in times like these that we realize the value of community, and we are grateful for the love you show our business day in and day out.” Then add whatever message you were going to talk about.
Finding small ways to start rooting them in their support of you may help them start to make the connection that your business could be impacted if panic or shut downs take hold in your area. Creating even a bit of momentum in this way could make it easier to leverage crisis communications later, and to do it in a way that calls back to the pride they felt a few weeks earlier when you told them how thankful you were for them.
Prepare Your Crisis Communications Policies
Businesses and non-profits of all types in Seattle have gotten a huge education on the fly about how to communicate in a crisis. This is actually a fairly formulaic process, but it is awfully difficult to think clearly and create a message when you’re in a time of stress. The good news for you is that there are a lot of businesses already putting messages out that you may be able to use as a starting point to draft your own.
First thing’s first, figure out who from your team needs to be part of the conversation to make decisions. Then decide who the official communications need to come from.
Official communications come in different forms:
Holding statements – This is the kind of message you put out to tell your audience that you are aware of the situation, you are aware of their concerns, and you are currently taking action to find solutions – but you don’t have all the answers yet. This allows you to buy time while being responsible and mitigating the volume of calls and emails you may receive. You can say what steps you are taking to find an answer without actually having to commit the details of the answer yet. There are a lot of examples of this if you look up “crisis communications holding statements” on Google. You may find that this situation evolves quickly enough for you that you have to include some decisions that are made while holding on other decisions, so see “Crisis Messaging – External” next for examples that relate to COVID-19.
Crisis Messaging – External – Based on the information you have, your team will internally need to evaluate and make decisions about the proper courses of action to take. Then you need to communicate it. Make a list of the stakeholders and forums where your announcement needs to be made so you can start with one message and then adapt it as needed for different audiences and forums. In Seattle, the situation with COVID-19 has evolved daily, so organizations made decisions a couple weeks ago with guidance on what triggers would prompt changing their decision. We have seen many organizations issue new statements to adapt policies or plans as the situation evolved. Here are some examples of messaging on social media:
- Seattle International Film Festival – https://www.facebook.com/SIFFnews/photos/a.66947434053/10157984017299054/?type=3&theater And https://www.siff.net/covid-19
- Ventures nonprofit – https://www.facebook.com/venturesnonprofit/photos/a.10150882390301811/10156880852431811/?type=3&theater
- Children’s Film Festival Seattle (1) – https://www.facebook.com/childrensfilmfestivalseattle/posts/2835723856466676
- Children’s Film Festival Seattle (2) – https://www.facebook.com/childrensfilmfestivalseattle/posts/2852511858121209
- Seattle Theatre Group – https://www.facebook.com/seattletheatregroup/posts/10156657880931682
- Emerald City Comic Con – https://www.emeraldcitycomiccon.com/About/A-Statement-From-Reedpop/
Links are easiest for me to share, but please know that most organizations sent more involved messaging via email that I am happy to forward if you ask me for it. The above message from Emerald City Comic Con that is sitting on their website is much closer to the long-form messaging that has gone out via email. Usually the format goes something like this:
- Begin with thanking everyone for their patience and asking them for continued patience at this time of high volume outreach
- Noting that they are monitoring the situation and linking the channels that they are monitoring (CDC, county public health departments, state health departments, etc.)
- Sharing that their hearts go out to those affected (in some way)
- Noting that public safety is of high priority for them and the actions they are currently taking at this time to make a decision – or noting the decision they have made and any policies in place
- For those that have made a decision to remain open, they are noting what actions they are taking to make their space as safe as possible (usually in line with what is recommended by their state or county public health information page), as well as encouraging proper health practices (as advised by their state/county public health information page or the CDC)
- If their business operations are heavily impacted, some are including one or two ways to continue to support them in this time
- Closing with thanking everyone for their support and patience in the difficult time and offering an email address or way to contact them with questions or concerns.
Crisis Messaging – Internal – Before you release a message like the above to the general public, attendees, registrants, or the community at large, make sure your team is the first to know what to expect. This may include staff, volunteers, contractors, or Board members, for example. Send them a confidential message before the public one goes out more widely. It may require giving them more detail. You may find that it increases appreciation and mitigates FAQs to give them a little more information about what options you were weighing out before you made the decision, so that they get why you are going in the direction you’re going.
Volume Mitigation – I’ve been seeing a few messages from large corporations go out in the last few days. For example, airlines and hotels that have me on their list have pinged out emails essentially saying, “We’re experiencing a high call volume right now. We understand that many are affected by breaking developments with COVID-19, and we want to make sure everyone knows the latest about our policies and procedures.” They link a page on their website with a statement, policies, and FAQs for this subject. I’m receiving these emails even though I didn’t call them, but they are doing advanced customer service to manage volume and manage expectations about their response time.
Seriously Think about Your Refund Policy
Example: The moment events started to cancel here, attendees were immediately and often angrily asking for refunds. No one had a refund plan in place that quickly. In fact, most events, businesses, and organizers can’t even financially withstand a full refund policy. But they were being pressured and often harassed to “DO THE RIGHT THING” and give back everyone’s money.
Let’s look at the big picture here. Registrants want their money refunded, because they paid for something that isn’t happening right now. They might have other expenses that they’ve sunk into this experience (travel, hotel, vacation time, child care), and they’re having to fight on all fronts. Event organizers have already sunk the costs for their events, and in many cases they aren’t getting that money returned to them. So, if they refund money to their registrants that they already spent, they go into negative cash flow and go out of business. The event organizers or businesses then ask for refunds from their host venues or suppliers, because they don’t need the space or the stuff anymore. But, the venue can’t sell that space anymore and the supplier may not be able to sell that stuff anymore. So, their option is to….lay off their team and – if enough events put that pressure on them, the business folds.
Here is a sad, but very real blog that perfectly illustrates the impact we’re seeing as described by a race director for running events. Read here: https://humanpotentialrunning.com/from-the-rd/pandemics-mass-gatherings-and-the-challenges-of-rds/
There is a major knock on affect, as you can see. From what I’ve observed in Seattle, your attendees and customers won’t care about that. They will ask you for refunds quickly, loudly, and in volume.
So how do we handle it?
First, look at your budget and understand the numbers. What can you do? Where do you end up in a tight spot? Assess this right now. Decide what you can do to balance customer service with your desire for your business to exist. This could look like full refunds, partial refunds, giving them credit for future purchases, vouchers, holding onto ticket fees for postponed events, etc.
Work up your language for your refund policy. If you are being generous with refunds, but it hurts your business, add in a guilt trip. Explain the impact on your business by giving refunds, the tight margins you have, that if they want your business to stay in business you need their help, and encourage them to consider donating the cost or converting it into a voucher or gift certificate for the future. For non-profits cancelling events, many have said, “please consider donating your ticket cost in lieu of attending” and even making registrants aware of what the suggested donation would have been.
A lot of people are flippantly talking about “I’ll go to that event next year” or “I’ll do that later in the year,” and they have not connected the dots that those businesses might not survive to that point, because the refunds are crushing them now.
Find Creative Ways to Keep the Cash Coming In
If your business is going to take a hit because people can’t show up somewhere, EDUCATE THEM ON THEIR OTHER OPTIONS TO SUPPORT YOU!!! What could this include?
- Buying a gift certificate
- Booking and paying now for a future session
- Buying online
- Ordering by phone and getting goods, food, or services delivered (for restaurants, in many countries there are services that exist to deliver food from restaurants to the customer)
- Ordering by phone and getting goods, food, or services left at your doorstep or their doorstep
- Live streaming your events, shows, meetings, etc. and taking payment online for it (an option entertainment groups are turning to, especially)
Here are some great ideas I’ve seen from other businesses:
- Shelly Bay Bakery (bread drop for a bakery with perishable goods): https://www.facebook.com/shellybaybaker/photos/a.695228993998296/1365383673649488/?type=3&theater
- Trophy Cupcakes – themed, vulnerable post about cupcake delivery – https://www.facebook.com/trophy.cupcakes/photos/a.85841630982/10157041407235983/?type=3&theater
- Myles Monroe and Tessa Cunningham Monroe (West coast swing dance professionals… the spring dance conventions are getting cancelled, so they’re hosting an online seven-day skills workshop. They’re doing it for free for their community, which is getting huge traction and a lot of new emails. You could charge for something like this if you wanted to, but they went with the free approach and will get more attendance because of it): https://www.facebook.com/events/197550031475973/
Service Businesses
Check. In. With. Your. Clients. Be there for them. In my case, I have worked extra hours for free for many of my clients in the last couple weeks, helping them to shift from long-term marketing strategies to short-term crisis communications and management. I want to be indispensable to them, and that requires extra customer service and outside the box thinking at this time.
If you’re a landscaper, a graphic designer, an artist that does remote shows, a coach, a consultant, or so many other businesses that exist by serving other businesses or individuals in a behind-the-scenes way, people are going to be advocating for you even less. They can’t see you, and they won’t notice if you go out of business or shut down for a month the way they might notice if they see the lights off at a brick and mortar. So, it’s even more important that we share these “how to” tips with our clients so that they can stay in business and – in turn – keep us in business.
Ally with other businesses to stay in the loop. Be ready to come up with payment plans if needed. Businesses like ours are sitting on a bubble that relies on everyone else to stay in business or to stay financially sound.
Farmers Markets, Trade Shows, and Collectives
If the forum where the businesses were going to gather disappears, it’s in everyone’s best interest to band together and find ways to create an alternative forum to sell their goods. I wouldn’t want to be a day staller at Pike Place Market or a vendor that makes all their income on the farmer’s market circuit here at this moment in time. Some of them have no other way to sell what they make. Some have perishable goods.
An example I love is that when Emerald City Comic Con postponed their event from March to August, it meant that all the artists who were going to be vendors in Artist Alley – where they would make a significant percentage of their revenue in commissions plus make contacts for future commissions – would forego the cash they were expecting to come in right now. So, they banded together to create #eccconline and #artistalleyonline. This was spearheaded by a couple of individual artists to coordinate all artists that wanted to be part of this. The artists are aggressively and actively messaging together, encouraging retweets and shares, and using the hashtag to create a movement that will allow people who wanted to experience Emerald City Comic Con to at least experience it in this way. And hopefully they will get sales in the process. This was thrown together in a week. Imagine what you could do with more time and an influencer or two behind you.
If you have a forum that will allow vendor sales, and you are not totally sure if it will be able to run as planned, start figuring out how to organize your list of community attendees so that you can find a way for everyone to pivot if needed.
Additional Resources
Here are a few to start with, specific to the US / the Americas:
- Find your local small business development center. Get a coach to help you through this: https://americassbdc.org/small-business-consulting-and-training/find-your-sbdc/
- SBA Disaster Loan Assistance – https://disasterloan.sba.gov/ela/Information/EIDLLoans
- SBA Guidance for Businesses and Employers to Plan and Respond to Coronavirus Disease 2019 – https://www.sba.gov/page/guidance-businesses-employers-plan-respond-coronavirus-disease-2019-covid-19
- “Ways to Support Local Businesses During Coronavirus” graphic – I found this share on the Webb City Area Chamber Facebook page, and I think this is a great thing to share out: https://www.facebook.com/webbcitychamber/photos/a.365156100183475/3063031697062555/?type=3&theater
- Washington Small Business Development Center business resiliency toolkit (Washington State-specific, but look for something similar in your area)- https://wsbdc.org/protect-your-business/business-resiliency/
- Seattle Foundation – COVID-19 Response Fund for Nonprofits (Seattle-specific, but look for something in your area) – https://www.seattlefoundation.org/communityimpact/civic-leadership/covid-19-response-fund
- UPAYA Social Ventures blog “Virtual Reality: Making an Online Fundraiser Connect with Donors” (UPAYA is one of the nonprofits in Seattle that had an event in the early days of the COVID-19 outbreak here, and they successfully transitioned it online and chronicled it here): https://www.upayasv.org/blog/2020/3/10/virtual-reality-making-an-online-fundraiser-connect-with-donors
I know this is a lot. This was a long blog. But it’s not everything. I could have spent weeks researching to find more resources to share with you myself, but I don’t want to delay getting this out there. So, if you know of a resource that would be helpful to small business owners or nonprofits in ANY COUNTRY, please comment with it below. If the resource is specific to a certain country, please include the country in your comment. I will vet all recommendations before I manually approve them.
If something I’ve written is already outdated, please let me know, and I will update it. I would rather update on the fly than wait to give people a starting point for information they need.
And please share this with your communities. As unprepared as we all are for the health crisis at hand, our communities are even less prepared for the economic crisis that results from the decisions we have to make to quell COVID-19. We can help each other significantly to mitigate the impact to our small businesses and nonprofits.
As a reminder, email me directly here if you want to tell me about a way that your business is currently coping with this. Or Email me directly here if you want to tell me – BRIEFLY – your situation and have me share examples/ideas I’ve heard about for your industry.
And if you want to have a quick reference to make sure your business is as ready as it can be for COVID-19, grab my checklist for COVID-19 Prep for Small Businesses and Non-profits. Download below, then check your email for the resource.
COVID-19 Prep Checklist
The post Small Business / Non-profit Tips for Surviving COVID-19 appeared first on Melissa Forziat Events and Marketing.