We talk to Pure360 Customer Success Manager, Katie Noonan, about marketing amid COVID-19, her inspirations and a little George Michael! Find out more as we delve into Katie’s advice for brands and marketers as we head into a ‘new normal’ and the power of creativity that has emerged from what has been a tumultuous time for all.

Please introduce yourself.

I’m Katie and I am a Senior Customer Success Manager at Pure360.

katie-noonanI’ve been at Pure360 for nearly 4 years and in my time here I have had the pleasure of working collaboratively with leading brands to help shape their customer strategy. 

It’s the collaborative working with clients that I enjoy the most, their success is my success and through the years I consider myself an extension to a lot of my clients’ marketing teams. 

What have been the main challenges facing marketers in 2020?

Covid-19 has been a challenge for marketers and consumers alike. Many fast thinking brands have found innovative ways to communicate with their consumers whilst consumers themselves are trying to adapt to the ‘new normal’. Covid has highlighted many things that I would imagine were always on the to do list for marketers, and one that seemed to crop up quite a lot was looking at strategies to grow lists. For some brands, when the volume of website visitors dropped, there was a realisation that they only had limited consumer reach during this time.  

What in marketing or business inspired you this year?

Where do I start? There have been so many brands shifting strategies and product offering to help with the pandemic. Big brands like Vauxhall making ventilators for the NHS, Beer company Brewdog shifting to help make more hand sanitiser and Pret giving discounts to NHS workers. These brands all made the headlines for their quick thinking but there are so many out there doing the same thing. One that stood out for me was a local barber shop in Brighton. Faced with no option but to close their doors, (for what seemed like the foreseeable) they changed tactics and set up a popup grocery shop. It was a quick thinking way for them to potentially save their business, it was super creative (the store looked great) and they stocked items that were needed because supermarket queues were getting bigger and bigger.

What should marketers be focused on in 2020? 

Avoid falling back into bad habits and dare to do something different. When things start getting back to a ‘new’ normal don’t take your foot off the gas, remember where you discovered pitfalls in your strategy, technology or data and prioritise these. Continue to be creative and take risks. Almost everyone has had to change and adapt at what felt like a moment’s notice, many brands didn’t wait to see what their competitors did; instead they ventured out and paved the way. 

Who are your marketing heroes?

One of my marketing heroes is a brand I’ve had the pleasure of working with is Innocent Drinks. Their primary objective is to bring joy and brighten their recipients’ mornings. If you follow them on social media or subscribe to their newsletter you will see how successful they are at doing this. They are an active part of the community, launching campaigns like; The Big Knit or The Big Grow. I love how they feature ‘real people’ stories and creations, it makes them a relatable brand. They create campaigns that are fun, humorous and most of all they get people talking. Check out their Bolt from the Blue campaign. What started as an everyday product launch turned into a massive online (fun) debate on whether the drink was actually Blue or Green. The online conversation created so much momentum that Innocent drafted in Duncan from Blue (the lead singer from the early noughties boy band) to continue the humour and turn it into a hugely memorable campaign that was hilarious to follow. Here’s the ‘it’s definitely blue campaign’ I love it!

If you could give a tip to marketers at this time during Coronavirus what would that be? 

We are all in this together, no one really knows what is going to happen in the next few months, will there be a second wave? Will consumers go back to old buying habits? Who knows?! What we do know is we have to continue to put the customer at the heart of everything we do, now more so than ever before.

A quote many of us like in The Customer Success team is “ marketing is a generous act of helping someone solve a problem. Their problem” Help do this by understanding who your customers are and how much your audience has changed during covid. Review your strategy. Do you do enough to educate and inspire? Do you have the data to help you understand what your buyers’ needs are?

What piece of advice would you give to aspiring marketers?

It’s not my advice, it’s a quote I like by Seth Godin. It’s something we should all remind ourselves of “The cost of doing something wrong is better than the cost of doing nothing” Seth Godin. 

You are sent to a desert island for 12 months – You can take 3 business books, 3 records and 1 luxury item – what would you take?

Books:

  • The chimp paradox 
  • The power of Habit 
  • How to win friends and influence people (an oldy but a goodie) 

Records

  • George Michael – Careless Whisper (I love all George Michael songs, picking one was hard) 
  • Arcade Fire – Electric Blue 
  • The XX – Night Time