Pandemic driven change drivers

Change is driven by a set of external/internal stimuli which forces an organisation or an individual to alter, streamline, improve, innovate, change how they conduct business or act. A combined set of such impetuses can be attributed as change drivers.

Allow me to draw your attention to the word “change”.

Fact: People will always resist change.

Why? We as species associate change with the fear of losing control. The key lies in ascertaining what those fears are and addressing them adequately.

Only time would tell how our current predicament will impact longterm organisational & consumer behaviour. Current drivers of change affecting both businesses and customers might include but are not limited to:

• Customer needs, perceptions & preferences
• Technology
• Socio-economic landscape
• Supply chain
• Delivery & fulfilment

Businesses will have to acknowledge these facets in light of the current situation and cater their offerings by leveraging all available selling channels accordingly.

These challenges are prevalent, here and now beckoning call for action, as of “yesterday”.

Businesses who take appropriate actions now will learn valuable lessons in business resilience and continuity. Unfortunately, a lot of businesses will not survive the current climate. This is not particularly good news as the SME’s are the backbone of any economy. That said, failure attributed to ‘no action’ to stay afloat will leave a gap in the market. This gap will be filled by businesses who had the resilience of riding the storm.

Remember, people buy from people. What must shine through our offering(s) is the genuine desire to facilitate rather than selling for profit alone. Inadvertently, you will be helping yourself regardless. Welcome to 101 on: How to build brand loyalty?

Customer centricity, now, than ever before is the key business driver. Businesses new or established, already selling online or yet to enter the e-commerce domain must revisit/visit all available online selling channels and leverage them to work harder for them.

There is no excuse for not having an online presence. Period. Finish. Fullstop!

Can’t build a transactional website to sell online? Start off by selling on established eCommerce channels like Amazon or eBay. After all,

Applied to eCommerce:

When it comes to selling physical goods online, as always, the content remains the keystone, in particular how the objects are represented to be consumed on a screen.

If they can’t see it, they won’t buy it. Well at least, not from you but from a vendor who has taken the effort of showcasing their wares, precisely & interactively.

How the objects are displayed online is akin to the customers’ ability to interact with the object in 2-dimensional space. Clear, high-quality images, consistent across the website, coupled with a detailed description will not only result in a higher conversions rate but will also reduce the rate of returns & churn.

I am afraid mobile device imagery is simply not good enough. You will either have to invest in setting up an in-house photography studio or outsource product photography to a professional product photography outfit. These options come with their own set of challenges. However, there are automated product photography studios designed to address all the pain points in product photography. One of the key players in this arena is Orbitvu who commands a major chunk of the market share in this space. Our solution(s) are being leveraged across the globe by a large number of enterprise-level household names and SME’s alike. Imagine an end-to-end plug & play solution with integrated studio lighting, capable of removing the background on the fly, producing static and or pack shots images. Churning 360° presentations (where the end customer can interact & rotate the item 360 degrees on a single axis) & producing videos. All this at a click of a button in a matter of seconds while uploading the results directly to your website. Read our 360 degree photography tutorial.

I was once approached by a market trader at a trade fair who used to sell shoes on market stalls and then proceeded to sell on Amazon & eBay. He looked at www.orbitvu.com solution offering, came to our offices the following week and placed the order on the same day. One of his comments stuck with me, he said:

Become the change agent in your organisation and embrace the change as it unfolds. Let us build a better world and leave a sustainable legacy for successive generations.

So here is to all the ones out there who will not roll over and die, who will never give up on their ideas & businesses, the ones who will see new opportunities in adversity, for those who will “never, never, never give up.” – Sir Winston Churchill.

You know who you are!

Malik Kashif Najmi