Business of Post Corona Era

This article is written while on seclusion due to the coronavirus, at my ancestral home. I’m thinking about the economic changes that may occur post to this quarantine period. I’m a bit scared and a little excited as well while thinking about the post lockdown period. Scared because I believe several businesses will lose this battle and close their account book. That will be an unavoidable event, and we can do nothing to save them. But on the other end, I’m excited because of the hope that opportunities that this crisis may create. Every disruption comes with an abundance of new chances to create wealth. Let’s have a look, what will be the changes that are going to happen to existing businesses and then how new the opportunities will be.

Before looking into how the opportunities will be, it will be fair to assume how long the lockdown period will last. Though the hard-core lockdown period may conclude by the end of April, the controlled situation may continue until the end of June. But it will take another three months to re-establish the pre-corona period in my assumption. That means, till the end of September, the troubles will continue. From October onwards, the market may start growing from what is remaining after the catastrophe. But we cannot assume the extent of damage that the virus can make to the market.

In my opinion, many changes may occur in the mindset of the consumer community after this lockdown. These changes are happening because they never had a break similar to this before, in their entire life back. This break is a unique opportunity to rethink many things that were taken-for-granted for decades.

Markets built on customers’ preferences. That means every product in the market created based on customers’ priorities. Companies developed their marketing strategy based on such tastes. This scenario is going to change, as the customers’ choices and favorites are changing. For example, the food habit of people may vary, and it will affect the shelves of grocery markets across different parts of the region. Change in this sequence shall have long term and short-term implications. In the short-term, they may change the priorities where the expenses shall make. So, necessary items will get a bigger slice of the pie, and others may get a lukewarm response from the customers. In the long run, customers may opt to completely abandon a set of products because they think they no more require it. At this outset, the businessmen should reflect on the customers’ feelings about their products or services, and they should bring necessary changes based on the conclusions.

Online learning may get traction, and educational institutions may go entirely online or on a hybrid model of offline and online learning modalities. For many years, students’ communities were doubtful about the effectiveness of the online systems of learning. Though it was gaining traction, the momentum was very low. This lockdown has changed everything, and attitude to such platforms is very positive now. Data shows that most MOOC websites are improved learners’ traffic. If a university is not recognizing this change, it may be out of the game in the coming years.

Work from home was a fancy term before. The corporate world never used this possibility to its full potential, except in a few cases. But in the coming years, this approach will change as companies identified it as an advantage that can save million on their balance sheet. This change will also reflect in attitude towards cities. A company working in Bangalore may not always insist on employees who work from home situated in the same city, in the coming days. An employee can sit in another city a few hours away from the office. This shift will affect many other industries, both in positive and negative possibilities.

Companies who affected with this lockdown severely may make a few months to recover from the backlash. It will pressurize the management to look for low-cost alternatives. This circumstance will reflect in employee configuration, and many people may lose their jobs temporarily. The tendency to find inexpensive options may not be limited to employees but also other areas like vendors, external services, and transportation systems. This condition will affect such services if they are not ready to provide such low-cost alternatives. Businesses involved in the B2B segment may put enough attention to the developments in this area, to make sure that they are persisting in the game.

[ATBC is a business strategy consulting organization. It focuses on strategic consulting services to companies in the scale-up phase. Business Strategy Consultant, Asif Theyyampattil, and his associate consultants collectively frame the organization. ATBC includes Financial Planners, Chartered Accountants, Chartered Engineers, Management Consultants, Company Secretaries, Branding& Marketing Experts, Social Media Consultants, Event Managers, Process Designers, Business Trainers, and Project Management Consultants, etc. Our focus is to create sustainable and profitable companies within our value framework. For details of the activities, please visit Asif Theyyampattil at www.atbc.co]

Some layers of the level of customers may blend to form a single group; it will intensify the competition. Companies who are addressing the needs of customers in the just above layer and just below layer come to a single group, and all the three layers may form a particular layer, and the companies who previously served the customer segment may start to compete for each other. This complicated position will completely change your equations, and significant fixes in strategy may be required.

Glorification using tools of marketing communications may be completely obsolete as customers are no longer looking for fancy things. Customers may become more conscious about value, and that will force companies to change their pricing and style of communication.

In the Indian context, this negative wave will have a double impact as we were on the verge of economic slowdown due to other reasons when the Corona outbreak occurred. Many companies were struggling to meet the resource requirements arising internally and externally. They were expecting government support to tackle problems faced by them. As a result, there are two opposite possibilities. Either we will enter into a completely dark age for few more years before we recover into a full swing, or we will gain muscle to face adversity facing by the economy and will make a quick recovery.

On the other side, this is a unique opportunity for many business enterprises. They can offload weight and build muscle for a new market that develops due to this global lockdown. Possibilities which are developing will be of two types. Opportunities for existing businesses to fine-tune their activities for the emerging market is the first type. A new player will have a never before plot where they can enter into markets that are occupied existing players for many decades.

As I described earlier, existing players need to adjust themselves to capture the evolving market due shift in the preferences of customers. They should carefully observe and identify the change in the existing choices of their customers. If they are successful, it will make it more comfortable for them to measure changes that may occur due to this event. But if they try to push the existing combination of products or services by thinking nothing happened, it may ruin their hope.

Post lockdown period will be a rare occasion for new entrants to dive into those closed markets, where existing players are making a situation where entry of an outside person is tight. An individual or a company that is looking for such an occasion may follow changes in the market and offer a better value accordingly. Existing players will face difficulty in identifying them as most of them think complacent about their capacity to serve the market. Please understand that this is your one-off chance to make an entry.

These are just assumptions based on my experience as a consultant in the market. Many studies shall be required to understand the post corona economic situation completely. For the time being, stay safe at home and keep social distancing.

Keep yourself updated about the changes that are happening across the world. To get insights from Asif Theyyampattil, please enable the ‘see first’ option after you like our Facebook page. All of us should alert because the world is tiny enough to affect the changes spontaneously to our markets as well.

Asif Theyyampattil

Founder – ATBC

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