At TEDx SFIT in 2020, I shared the unseen, exciting side of the New Normal. For those of you who enjoy watching a video instead of reading, here is the video of the talk. If not, you can read the speech ahead 🙂
The Speech (As on August, 2020)
If I ask you to paint a picture of the post-Covid-19 era, I am sure you will draw a bleak, grey, dark scenario. Pre-coronavirus era was comfortable and familiar. The pandemic is forcing us to leave this comfort zone behind and cross the border into the unexplored, unprecedented, unknown.
Like everyone else, I too am scared and anxious about what to expect from this grey future, But I have secretly found a way to see it as colorful and exciting. Wondering what is that secret way?
It is to look at this future, this ‘new normal’ as a marketer!
As marketers, it is second nature for us to look for the positive, however small, however minuscule; in any product/ service/ offering. It is our job to paint a picture of possibilities and benefits; to figure out reasons to like something; to prove its merits and thus get you, the consumer, excited to give it a try.
So here I am, as a marketer, ready to convince you about the merits of the post-Covid world or as everyone loves calling it, the ‘new normal’.
But before we get to that, firstly, how did marketing help me see the ‘new normal’ with excitement? Let me connect the dots.
‘New normal‘ as an ‘offering/assignment’ that needs to be marketed
I thought of this ‘new normal‘ as an assignment that needed to be marketed to others. To do that well, I poked at the post-Covid future from the top, bottom, side, front and back to see if it had any positive, unique, exciting aspects. I found enough points to make a tidy little list of benefits.
I also identified its USP i.e. Unique Selling Proposition.
Now I am finally ready to market this ‘new normal‘ to you. To convince you to give it a chance, to look forward to it not just with trepidation, but also with a dose of excitement.
In other words, I am ready to market hope for the future! A bit ambitious, I know, but worth a shot, right?
I am not saying everything is going to be rainbows and sunshine. What I am saying, as the marketer of the ‘new normal’, is that it can be good looking if you just look at it from another angle.
So…let’s begin!
What is my marketing objective?
At the end of the talk, I wish to hear you say “Bring on the post-Covid future! I am keen to meet it”
Who is my target audience?
Anyone who is currently looking at the ‘new normal‘ with skepticism, fear, anxiety and a huge question mark.
Now the most important marketing question…
What is the USP of this ‘New Normal’?
The answer? This is NOT the ‘new normal’. ‘This is the normal for the NEW us’.
Think about it. It is not really ‘normal life’ that has changed. It is WE. We have become upgraded versions of ourselves i.e. version 2.0 because of the pandemic.
In this new, upgraded avatar, we are more independent, more hygiene and health conscious.
We now know what is healthy food, what will help boost immunity, what preventive medications to take, the list goes on. Thanks to mountains of information given by the Government, doctors, WHO, CDC, parents, friends, basically every fellow human being, we all have almost become Phd level experts on Covid-19. Obviously, I am exaggerating. But not by much.
Our version 2.0 is also getting used to the increased level of convenience like working from home, zero commuting, getting everything home delivered, even items that were not available online earlier, consulting with doctors online, among other things.
Did you know that in Britain, less than 1% of initial medical consultations took place via video link in 2019; under lockdown, 100% are occurring remotely?
Mckinsey
This change hasn’t brought down lightning or thunder, right? It isn’t scaring us because it simply happened; one day at a time, subtly but surely.
It will be ‘normal’ for the New Us to expect hygiene, health, safety AND convenience from every other place or business outside of home.
Be it a grocery shop, our office, malls, restaurants, public transport, anything you can think of.
77% of consumers will be more cautious about cleanliness, health and safety. 62% of consumers will switch to brands that show higher levels of product safety.
Capgemini
For our life after coronavirus to be ‘normal’, all it has to do is adapt itself to suit the wants and needs of the NEW US. I say since ‘Normal for the New Us’ promises to be a cleaner, safer, more convenient alternative, so please bring it on!
Need more convincing?
Let’s take a look at some select benefits of this ‘Normal for the New Us’, shall we?
1. Future has come early
Firstly, I am sure most of us would have received this forward : “I am not adding this year 2020 to my age. I did not use it”.
Though this was a humorous take on 2020, it contained a tiny kernel of truth. We could not do a lot of the things we planned for in 2020. Feels like the year is getting wasted.
Don’t feel too bad though. Even though 2020 itself is sort of getting wasted, it has managed to bring the future forward by at least 2 years.
“We have seen 2 years worth of digital transformation in 2 months”.
Satya Nadella, Microsoft
During the lockdown, the capitalization of a once obscure video conferencing company called Zoom surpassed that of the top 7 airlines combined.
Capgemini
Live streaming shops in China increased by over 700% during the lockdown.
Capgemini
This preponement of the future is not restricted to digital transformation only. Think remote working and work from home, plant based meats, veganism and many more.
Facebook recently posted the job requisites for a “Director of Remote Work.“
Bain
32% of organizations are replacing full-time employees with contingent workers as a cost-saving measure.
Gartner
At the end of May, refrigerated plant-based meat saw sales increase 63%—it now accounts for 2% of retail packaged meat sales.
Ypulse
These and many other trends were already underway but were expected to take many more years to take root. Yet the pandemic has brought them forward and into the mainstream in the last 2-3 months.
If you look at it differently, by bringing the future to the present, don’t you think this ‘Normal for the NEW US’ is indirectly saving 2 years of our time or helping us achieve things 2 years faster?
2. ‘Smarter’ normal
The post pandemic future is going to be a ‘Smarter normal.’ Why? Because we have become smarter than before. We have learnt to work smarter instead of working harder, figuring out how to do a given piece of work remotely and quickly. We are now smarter and more independent home managers, learning how to balance housework with office work and how to do so without help, in the least amount of time.
Haven’t we also become smarter and quicker at making decisions, especially about work? An interesting experience shared by a senior business leader in a McKinsey research “Decision making accelerated when we cut the nonsense. We make decisions in one meeting, limit groups to no more than 9 people and have banned Powerpoint”.
We are going to be smarter travellers i.e when, where, how to travel in the safest and quickest way. Our comfort with technology has gone up and with it, our tech skills. Lastly, we have become smarter and super quick at pivoting and adapting to the changing circumstances.
A US-based retailer launched curbside delivery in two days versus the previously-planned 18 months.
McKinsey
Hardware business not working? Let’s start selling medical necessities like dispensers, thermometers, etc. Nobody booking hotel stays? Let’s launch ‘Book now, Holiday later’ offer.
We have all upskilled or been retrained in newer areas, adding to the smartness quotient of our future.
Isn’t such a smarter future brighter?
3. ‘Future Pandemic’ Ready
This headline by Bloomberg totally nailed it when it said “What Prepares a Country for a Pandemic? An Epidemic Helps” Bloomberg.
Various publications (The Guardian, CNBC, CNN) and research reports alike, recognized SARS and MERS epidemics as the main reason for helping Asian countries like Taiwan, South Korea, Singapore, Japan control Covid-19 pandemic so much better than the rest of the world.
“Taiwan rapidly produced and implemented a list of at least 124 action items in the past five weeks to protect public health”.
Stanford report
“In the 17 years since it was hit hard by the SARS outbreak, Taiwan has been in a state of constant readiness to the threat of emerging infectious disease. As a result, when information concerning a novel pneumonia outbreak was first confirmed on December 31, 2019, Taiwan began implementing onboard quarantine of direct flights from Wuhan that same day”
The Hindu
We can say that their SARS experience has made these countries ‘Pandemic Ready’. Similarly, think of the current pandemic, the lockdown, masking, hand hygiene and the whole enchilada as preparing us to handle any future pandemics.
Next time some other animal based virus decides to leave its host and come travelling towards humans, we and our governments will be ready. Our new habit, health focus, smartness and agility will help us and our governments shrug it off far more easily and quickly.
4. Speed of innovation
Software, products, processes that used to take months or years got deployed within days or weeks. Factories were modified almost overnight to make sanitizers, masks, ventilators.
Mahindra had made ventilator design in 48 hours. They were going to make them at their manufacturing plants.
The Statesman
Hospitals were set up within days. Wipro converted its IT facility to a 450 bed coronavirus hospital in 4 weeks.
Super speed has become the default setting for us, be it at home or at work, to stay afloat and keep up with everything happening around us. People are forgiving of mistakes in such uncertain times. They are ready to try even beta versions so long as they are created and delivered immediately. They are ok if you make corrections and changes along the way.
We adopted new technology overnight—not the usual years—as we have a higher tolerance for mistakes that don’t threaten the business.
McKinsey
So for our brands and businesses and for us as individuals, especially those of us who were laid off, we can treat this as the ‘proof of concept’ phase and confidently launch new offerings with speed.
Also, in the interest of speed, decision making power is now given even to frontline people. Isn’t that a very positive and morale boosting new practice?
5. An ocean of job openings instead of a job pool
With a lot of businesses shutting down or facing financial crunch, many of us lost our jobs. What we need to realize is that where pre-Covid, we were stuck looking for jobs in our own city or country, right now, there are no boundaries limiting our job search.
Almost everyone around the world is working from home. Most businesses are looking at skill count instead of headcount i.e. what skills are needed to do a particular job instead of how many people are needed to complete it.
Skill based hiring
Many organizations, such as Allianz Global Investors and Cisco, have already set up internal project marketplaces that break down work into tasks and projects that can be matched with people from anywhere in the organization with relevant skills and availability. These marketplaces can enable people who suddenly find themselves bereft of their normal job tasks to quickly and easily find different work using their core or adjacent skills where their contributions make a difference.
Harvard Business Review
Global talent pool
It doesn’t matter which part of the world the skill is coming from. “One such opportunity will be increased access to new talent pools as a result of remote working. “Being able to tap into global talent has always been a challenge for us in [the Middle East] because people have to relocate,”….“The crisis will change that. In the coming 12 to 24 months and beyond, we’ll be hiring people from Scotland or Maine or Tokyo—and they won’t have to relocate. This was an alien idea before, and while it won’t happen right away, it will happen.”
McKinsey report
(Companies) will alter policy and procedure to make remote work more available and in doing so recognize that they can tap a global pool of highly skilled workers.
Forbes
So what are you waiting for? Take a quick, thorough stock of your skills and start pitching those skills to companies near and far. Your probability of finding a job will go up dramatically.
Also, with remote working passing the test, more women and even disabled people can join the remote workforce.
With many workplaces now being forced to operate remotely, long-term flexibility could be here to stay, allowing more women to remain in the workforce while balancing home and work life.
Economic Policy Institute
Remote working, for example, means no commuting, which can make work more accessible for people with disabilities; Moreover, remote working means companies can draw on a much wider talent pool.
McKinsey
Isn’t that great news for all the women who took a break to take care of family and for the disabled who had difficulty finding work because of mobility issues?
6. Relationship Riches
How many of us played poker with friends on Zoom, Psych with cousins, virtual housie or taboola, did Google Hangout calls and Whatsapp games, spend more time with our kids and parents? Almost all of us did this and more, right? Didn’t we all reconnect with our families, friends and colleagues on an emotional level during the lockdown? We realised what we were missing out on in the BC Era i.e. Before Coronavirus Era. Now, with the lockdowns easing, we are continuing this revival of social bonds by calling over small groups of friends and family for games, gossip and restaurant delivered food. The trend of ‘friends at home’ vs ‘out with friends’ was already getting popular and now it too has gone mainstream. Isn’t that a warm, welcoming future?
So, let’s end with a quick recap: we are having more fun with friends and family, we could probably earn in foreign currency while lounging in our nightdress, are working smarter, with more freedom to take decisions and try new things at work, enjoying a future that has come at least 2 years early; wearing the shield of ‘Pandemic Ready’…Man! Is this good or is this good!
Are you finally looking forward to this future after Covid-19? Shall we ‘bring it on’ and let the adventure unfold?