Shopper Activation is of course about 1-on-1 contact with people, shoppers, customers and preferably at large scale high-traffic locations, in shops and at fairs and events. That unfortunately is no longer sensible or even possible in the current situation. Which is why most of our jobs in the field have come to a standstill: our sampling and promotional teams, our merchandisers, our hostesses at airports, our in-store demonstrations in retail, our hostess services at major events etc..
But all our agencies throughout Europe are still available during this rather bizarre period. We can call and/or email and WhatsApp, so that we are all prepared for the moment that we can start performing our jobs again.
In addition to the permanent jobs we run for our clients, and the tactical in-store demos booked for future sales periods, there are a lots of activations that we can prepare in advance, many of which are now being discussed with our customers. When can we activate these campaigns? Only time will tell, it could be in a few weeks or a few months, but only when it is possible to again.
So for now: we do what we can. We keep our people involved, work behind the scenes on sharing of best practices and try to help out each other, our customers and our people where we can. And after this we will resume the work we are good at: ‘live communications’.
So for now: stay healthy, use your common sense, keep in touch and see you soon.
All the best, on behalf of the entire group of agencies forming the ISMG.