Our content consumption has increased multifold and is greater than ever right now.By Amit Dhawan

My conversations these days with almost every brand that Im consulting or every person that Im teaching at the Academy are about this one thing - Our operations are in a hit, should we still be spending on marketing or creating content? And if yes, then what should we communicate or talk about as we cant sell at the moment?

Pretty relatable, isnt it? I did a webinar on digital marketing a couple of days back with about 500 attendees who had tons of questions. Almost 80% of the questions revolved around this same topic.

The answer here is very simple and Ill come to it, but before that, let us quickly do a retrospective and analyze how our day looks like in the current lockdown situation. Now while each one of us might have a different kind of day basis our jobs and responsibility division at home, but 2 things are common with all of us: The tremendous amount of digital media were consuming, and.. the dishes were washing. (You cant disagree with either of these, can you?)

Now this is just one aspect. Here is another - because of the crisis, most industries and brands have greatly reduced or completely stopped spending money on advertising. This means, because of low competition, bid costs have gone extremely low on all digital platforms like Facebook and Google, which means, there is a much higher ROI compared to the pre-pandemic times. The cost of advertising has gone down, a lot.

Looking at the two points above, it is obvious that you should be creating content. But, let me tell why you must be creating content, and that too more than ever.

It is a fact that our attention spans while consuming content are extremely short. We do not spend too much time on a piece of content while browsing through social media and it hardly registers in our mind, let alone the brand name. Now with growing demand in content and increasing production by content creators, the fight for attention is even tougher to hit the recall with the audience you care about. If youre not showing up consistently, you will be forgotten very easily and very soon.

Persistent efforts, consistent communication, and frequent reminders - are some rules of the game we all have to stick to in order to just be eligible for the play.

Now lets look at what to communicate or post during the lockdown period and how to push out so much content.

Inspired by our very own Modi ji and his CO.RO.NA. abbreviation (which in our case, can very well translate to COntent ROko NAhi ) if you remember in one of his recent public addresses, what Ive created is called the COVID-19 Strategy.

Heres how it goes:

C - Converse The first step is to listen to and converse with your target audience. Thats the best form of content anyone can create. Talk to your audience if they are reaching out to you or even if they are not. Conversational content works the best on Social Media. Remember, conversation is a 2-way thing. 🙂

O - Organize This is my favorite hack to content creation, as well as a massive recall-booster. With everyone having some spare time at hand, it is a good idea to organize online events like a LIVE or a Webinar where you can exchange informative or entertaining content with your viewers. This is THE easiest way to generate content that would actually engage your audience.

V - Vocalize Considering the current scenario, a lot is happening in the world. Brand or you as a personal brand, MUST voice out your opinion and stand for something you truly believe in. That will help you in one, creating content of course, but also in pulling people together who believe in what you believe.

I - Innovate With so much happening around, being in the moment and also innovative at the same time is the need of the hour. Dont fear experimenting with new things while creating a topical piece of content and it shall fly!

D - Document Documenting is a great way to substitute the efforts in creating fresh pieces of content from scratch. You can document the activities that the brand is doing to support the government in fighting the pandemic, or behind the scenes of operational hassles and how the brand or you are creatively tackling everyday stuff in a fun way...

19 - 19 pieces of content, every single day! This is the most important piece of the puzzle. Now I dont mean that you literally need to make 19 pieces of content, that is just a number. But produce as much as you can. From 5 to 50 posts a day as well if you are able to, which Im sure you very easily can if the above steps are followed. I am doing it, for myself, as well as for our brands. So, can you. The content can be in the form of image-based creatives, stories, videos, platform specific adapts, articles, and so on. There is no limit here.

It is not only recommended to create content (a lot of it), but it is a MUST DO in all possible ways. If youre not doing that, youll be out of the game pretty soon because what is happening right now is a massive change of audience behavior which is here to stay.

The only way to slay, is to up your creative play.

-The author is co- founder, Sociowash Digital Academy and head of digital Business. Views expressed are personal.

Read more:
The COVID-19 strategy for creating content during the pandemic - ETBrandEquity.com