The world is going through the worst pandemic witnessed in past 100 years that created havoc in the economy and growth aspects across the globe. The global economy has almost become stand still and thanks to the efforts

of the global scientists to produce effective vaccines to curb the spread of the virus, which helped to revive the economies of different countries across the world. However, the evolution of the virus keeps the world on toes and the continuation of the pandemic. Now, the companies are fighting all odds to keep their businesses to stay afloat and survive through the pandemic. The companies are using different techniques to go through these troubled times including downsizing, cutting costs to name a few. There are numerous companies survived through this pandemic and became successful and even some of them achieve enormous growth like Amazon. This article focuses on analyzing and understanding the marketing practices of those companies who achieves the success and growth through the pandemic, thus providing certain marketing aspects (mantras) for the struggling companies to learn, adopt, and apply through their marketing practices to achieve success and growth.  

Consumer Orientation is one of the primary aspects that enabled the successful companies to survive through the pandemic. Understanding the expectations of consumers is the paramount aspect that any company should follow to achieve success. The company needs to identify the target consumers, predict, learn and understand the expectations of consumers and categorize the consumers based on their expectations such as basic expectations and value added expectations. For example, the pandemic forced all the consumers to use hygiene products such as hand wash, hand sanitizer, and above all, the masks to protect from the infection of the virus. The successful companies understood the requirements of the consumers and launched the variant of hygiene products to satisfy the needs of all segment of consumers. All the business entities moved into the online space and started catering to the consumers. The leading food oriented retail establishments commenced the same day delivery, even, the delivery in 60 minutes to cater to the needs of consumers.

Consumer Psyche is one of the prominent aspects that the companies should understand whilst developing and offering products/services to the target consumers. Nowadays, the companies are developing and offering solutions instead of positioning as products/services. The companies need to develop the solutions to satisfy the problems/issues of the target consumers. The consumers usually get emotional whilst buying products/services, thus often affected by the emotional aspects such as fear, anxiety, confusion to name a few. Therefore, the companies need to focus on developing and offering solutions that would provide assurance, empathy and value to the target consumers, thus diffusing the negative emotions towards buying products/services. It is a concerted exercise the companies should involve to achieve the loyalty of the target consumers.

Consumer Promise is yet another vital aspect that the companies should fulfil through developing and offering solutions to the target consumers. The companies often communicate to the target consumers about the value derived through using the products/services/solutions offered. Many instances, the companies failed to deliver the promises communicated to the target consumers. Such instances affect the consumers trust towards the companies, thus leading to the distrust among the target consumers. Especially during the pandemic, the consumers are affected the emotional aspects such as fear, anxiety, and confusion, such aspects affect consumers buying behavior and decisions. It is imperative for the companies to communicate and deliver the promises through the offering to diffuse the negative emotions and apprehensions whilst buying products/services/solutions. The companies those who could deliver such promises would win the hearts and minds of the target consumers.

Consumer Reviews is yet another important aspect that the companies should pay heed, listen, adopt and implement the suggestions to the business practices. Consumer reviews play a prominent role in influencing buying decisions of online consumers. During the pandemic, it is becoming more prominent in influencing the consumer buying decisions and play a vital role in deciding the fate of offline entities through online reviews like google reviews. It is imperative for the companies to deliver the promises to achieve positive reviews to attract more footfalls, thus leading to revenues, profits and growth through pandemic. The successful companies focus on achieving the consumer trust, elicit positive reviews and thrive to achieve growth and success even during the troubles times like pandemic.

Consumer Delight is the main aspect of achieve success and growth through pandemic as the successful companies delighted their target consumers through their offering and solutions. Consumer delight is the ‘X’ factor used by the successful companies to win the hearts and minds of consumers, needless to say, the money share. Consumer delight could be achieved through numerous ways such as provide surprise offers, offer free add-on products, offer free services such as valet services for car servicing, Free lunch and dinner during hotel stays, home banking services such as collection of cheques, even deliver money to consumers to name a few. Consumer delight is the vital aspect to influence consumer-buying decisions, above all, the loyalty and trust of the consumers.

In nutshell, the article portrays the critical marketing mantras (aspects) that the companies should follow during the pandemic to achieve success and growth. The practicing companies should inherit these aspects as a part of their grand strategies and ensure the successful implementation to win the hearts and minds of the target consumers. It is vital to understand that the consumers are partners of the business who help and ensure the success and growth of any successful company. Therefore, the companies need to keep the target consumers as a core aspect of their businesses, and endeavor to develop and deliver the offerings and solutions to satisfy the consumers’ requirements, to fulfill promises made to win the hearts, minds and above all, the money share to fuel the success and growth.