By Poornima Mohandas | 2 min read

Everyday you want to deliver value in your job, now more than ever. A recent survey of product marketers showed how the focus on value has been heightened during the Great Lockdown of 2020. This is a time when you need to pick up and drive new Product Marketing project ideas that will make your leadership sit up and take notice. 

Here are five high-visibility, product marketing projects you can drive on a shoe-string budget during this crisis. All of them have an objective to attract or retain customers. 

1. Reposition to New Segments

If your target base is severely affected by the current crisis, you will want to look for new verticals and markets that are relatively less affected. For instance, if your target base has traditionally been retail and hospitality, you will now want to diversify into other verticals like healthcare or online education and see if there is a product market fit. After many customer calls and rigorous market research, you want to develop positioning and messaging, which your marketing and sales can then use to appeal to the new market segments.

2. Gather Customer Stories

Your customers may be delaying payments, but if they still use your products and are happy with you, this is a good time to ask something of them. Ask your happy customers to share their story with you. It doesn’t cost them anything. It can be done remotely. Plus, it will mean a LOT to your business. 

You can leverage the story in many ways such as: 

• A customer-focused blog post
• A case study
• A customer quote on your website and in your sales deck 
• Social media posts…

3. Create a Product Microsite 

When customers are hesitant to buy, what can you do? You can educate them further on your product and its value. As and when they are ready, they will know exactly what to buy. Given that 67% of the buyer journey is done digitally, this is a great opportunity for your inbound strategy to educate your target market with product-related content, benefits-oriented messaging, and tools. 

Create a product microsite — a set of interconnected product-focused web pages– that speak to your target personas.  

You can cover:

• Messages to your key buyers
• Key capabilities and benefits
• Plenty of screenshots
• Demo videos 
• An ROI calculator and much more. 

Here is a list of some really cool microsites to get you started. If you have a web developer and a designer in house, you can be off to the races with zero budget! Check out my award-winning post on how to create a killer microsite. 

4. Proactive Customer Engagement 

Everyone knows it is way easier to keep a customer than to win a new one. So focus on your flock and keep them reassured and happy. Have a well-thought out customer communication plan with a regular cadence of emails, product training webinars, customer newsletters, virtual networking sessions and the like. 

If you are expecting interruptions in your product/service due to reduced manpower/servers let your customers know two weeks ahead of time so they can plan for the disruption. 

5. Thought Leadership Content

Use the lockdown to plan and create a steady stream of thought leadership content with a good mix of :

• Whitepapers
• Webinars
• Ebooks
• Infographics 
• Explainer videos (if budget permits)

New assets will keep your blog and social media channels buzzing with something new and exciting to offer every time a visitor tunes in. Be sure to extend the life of relevant assets as CTAs or Call to Actions on your product microsite.  

Once you decide to take up one of these project ideas, be sure to chalk out the objective, timeline, and expenses if any and present it to your boss and peers to get their ideas and buy in.

The recent survey I conducted of product marketers revealed that most product marketers are spending most of their time on creating thought leadership content during this crisis. That provoked me to write this piece. I think this downtime can be utilized for much more. This is a long, dry spell that product marketing can use to drive long-term, high-value initiatives like creating a library of case studies, a proactive customer communication strategy, and a well-structured product microsite, all of which can help you attract and retain customers over the long term. For more on how to plan and execute these project ideas subscribe to my blog.