Marketing

Our Covid-19 Tracker charts the changing daily attitudes and behaviours of 1000s of global consumers – capturing real customer voice and forecasting future consumer trends. As Government restrictions ease, our week eight report takes a detailed look at the changing face of the Post Covid-19 consumer.

Click below to download our full report, tracking the thoughts, feedback and opinions of our global community from the onset of the crisis.

Mental Health 

• Anxiety levels have levelled off over the last two weeks with the overall average reducing marginally from 62% to 60%.
• Negative sentiment continues to dominate the minds of our community members – especially in the UK and Brazil.
• Concerns about family members catching the virus remain the biggest worry. Financial worries and boredom are on the rise, especially in the US and UK.

Shopping 

• Users continue to move to online shopping across the majority of our communities – as social distancing guidelines remain in place. However, the declining trend in the UK and Brazil continues with around 15% in Brazil and 4% in the UK now shopping online.
• With the easing of lockdown, the trend of stockpiling is settling down in France and Italy. Across other communities, however, this remains unstable with spikes being observed in the US, UK and Brazil.

‘New Normal’ 

• Key positives emerging from Covid-19 are a bigger focus on health, fitness, nutrition and hygiene. Lockdown has also encouraged people to address their work/life balance and spend more quality time with family.
• COVID-19 has brought about a number of learnings which will bring change to our users’ day-to-day attitudes and behaviours, including being ‘pandemic-ready’ and recognising the importance of their healthcare systems and infrastructures.

Work 

• Unemployment continues to rise – particularly in the US and Brazil.
• We are also observing an increase in those working less than they did before, meaning those still working are having hours and shifts cut.
• Working from home has declined in Italy and France with governments encouraging people to return to work. However, it continues to rise in other countries.

Satisfaction with Government varies across countries 

• Satisfaction with Government response and actions has improved in the US, while it remains moderate in Italy and the UK, and low in France and Brazil. While people feel that the government is taking initiatives to support them in the US, the easing of lockdown is not being supported in the UK,
• The dissatisfaction in France and Brazil stems from the perception of delayed response, lack of enough PPE and financial benefits not reaching the people.

Response on press coverage

• Opinions stand divided on press coverage and behaviour; while most find it informative, accurate and helpful, others find it to be a source of overly negative and depressing information.
• Low perception of news being positive, rather perceived to be extremely negative in France with low objectivity.

Our Covid-19 Tracker charts the changing daily attitudes and behaviours of 1000s of global consumers – capturing real customer voice and forecasting future consumer trends. As lockdown eases, our week six report begins to explore the post Covid-19 consumer.

Click below to download our full report, tracking the thoughts, feedback and opinions of our global community from the onset of the crisis.

Mental Health 
•  With lockdown beginning to ease, we are starting to see a decline in levels of anxiety – with those who ‘feel anxious about the situation’ falling from 70% to 62% over the last three weeks.
•  Negative sentiment continues to dominate the minds of our community members – especially in the US and Italy.
•  Concerns about family members catching the virus remain the biggest worry. Financial worries are also on the rise.

Shopping 
•  Users continue to move to online shopping across the majority of our communities – as social distancing guidelines remain in place. However, we have seen a decline of around 10% in the UK and around 19% in France over the last week.
•  Numbers of users stockpiling continues to go up and down, with no clear pattern emerging. This week we have observed a spike in Italy and the US, but seen a sharp decline in the UK, France and Brazil.

‘New Normal’ 
•  Key positives emerging from Covid-19 are a bigger focus on health, fitness, nutrition and hygiene. Lockdown has also encouraged people to address their work/life balance and spend more quality time with family.
•  Covid-19 has brought about a number of learnings which will bring change to our users’ day-to-day attitudes and behaviours. These include being ‘pandemic-ready’, planning food resources better and having more appreciation of family time. 

Work 
•  Unemployment continues to rise – particularly in the US and Italy.
•  We are also observing a rise in those working less than they did before, meaning those still working are having hours and shifts cut.
•  Working from home continues to rise. We anticipate seeing a slow decline here as governments across our communities begin to encourage those who can do so to return to work.

Satisfaction with Government varies across countries 
•  High satisfaction with Government response and actions in Italy, moderate in US and UK, and low in France and Brazil. The dissatisfaction stems from the perception of delayed response, lack of enough PPE and financial benefits not reaching the people.
•  Users generally feel that governments have taken the right decisions on social distancing, lockdown and isolation.

Response on press coverage
•  Opinions stand divided on press coverage and behaviour; while most find it informative, accurate and helpful, others find it to be a source of overly negative and depressing information.
•  Low perception of news being positive, rather perceived to be extremely negative in the UK and Italy with low objectivity.

In the last six weeks, the outbreak of Covid-19 has irreversibly transformed our lives. Our homes are no longer just homes, they are offices, classrooms, and gyms. We are cut off from friends and family, and socialising via screens. We are living, shopping, working differently.

Across the globe, thousands have lost their lives, and millions have lost their livelihoods. Governments are taking drastic, unprecedented measures to support their economies, their health systems and their people, while individuals are doing what they can to raise money and moral.

Amidst the turmoil have been beacons of light. In a time of isolation, the idea of community has never been more important. We’ve seen waves of clapping, live music from balconies, army captains raising millions. We’ve seen businesses stepping in to donate ventilators, and industry turning its hand to new innovations.

Global brands have also been going above and beyond to help out in this time of need – with everything from simple donations to far-reaching support initiatives. With that in mind, we asked our global insights community to tell us who their brand heroes have been during the epidemic. Here’s a list of their top five. It’s as surprising as it is inspiring…

DoorDash
Food delivery services like DoorDash and UberEats have become game-changers in a world where going out to eat is prohibited, providing meals to families every day, while promoting health, safety and social distancing. Both DoorDash and UberEats are providing free protective equipment to their employees. DoorDash has also rolled out a commission relief and marketing support programme for independently owned restaurants that could be hurt by lack of customers. They have added more than 100,000 small businesses to their app, offering no commission fees, $0 delivery fees, and over $20 million in marketing efforts to generate revenue for independent restaurants already on the app.

Google 
Google is supporting people in more ways than one. They are making it easier to stay connected with loved ones, co-workers, and students when virtual communication is the only option, by making premium features of their Google Hangout technology free to everyone. In addition, Google has led the way with unique relief efforts, such as giving $25 million worth of advertising credit to the World Health Organization (WHO) and donating over $1 million to purchase medical supplies and provisions for frontline workers. Google technology is also being used in the research of the virus’s structure.

Verizon
With our work, education, and social lives now being entirely online, having access to wireless data is essential. Verizon, along with many other phone service providers like AT&T, Vodafone and Telstra are making sure their customers can still afford to stay connected on their devices. Verizon is waiving all late, international, activation, and upgrade fees, and offering free extra data plans up to 15GB. And, they have a variety of free calling packages and learning tools available for healthcare workers and teachers.

Alcohol Distilleries
Hundreds of gin, vodka, whiskey, and beer distilleries and breweries all over the globe are halting their alcohol production and switching to making hand sanitiser in an effort to keep up with demand while keeping it at affordable prices – AND keeping their employees on the payroll. Popular brand names in the UK like BrewDog have donated sanitiser to local charities and care facilities. 58 Gin has even created personalised bottles of hand sanitiser, where you can pick your own scent, colour, and label. Our online focus groups reacted well to examples of brand compassion such as this.

The Body Shop
While cosmetics brands may not come to mind right away in the fight against Covid-19, The Body Shop is setting an excellent example of tackling issues that are a direct result of the virus. In addition to keeping all of its employees on their payroll and donating over 30,000 soap products to vulnerable communities and hospitals, they have teamed up with NO MORE to support and provide resources to those trapped in domestic abuse situations due to stay at home mandates.

The real heroes – the front-line health workers
And of course, our global research community is thankful for all the health care providers facing the coronavirus head on every day – the real heroes risking their lives to protect and care for those affected.

Our Covid-19 Tracker charts the changing daily attitudes and behaviours of 1000s of global consumers – capturing real customer voice and forecasting future consumer trends. Click below to download our full week four report, tracking the thoughts, feedback and opinions of our global community from the onset of the crisis.

Mental Health 
•  As the lockdown continues, the levels of anxiety remain high – with 74% of respondents feeling anxious. Of all our communities, the most significant spikes in anxiety levels during week four can be observed in Italy. 
•  Despite a slight improvement vs week three, negative sentiment towards the current reality continues to dominate the minds of our community members.
•  Concern about family members catching the virus remains high week-on-week . However, fears around financial worries/job security continues to increase – being most prevalent in the US.

Shopping 
•  Moving to online shopping remains high across most of our global communities – as lockdown and social distancing persists. However, for some communities this has actually fallen during week four, notably Italy and the US.
•  Stockpiling continues to increase in the UK, France and Brazil, but has declined in Italy and the US.
•  Long-life products and essentials remain the most common items in the basket. Users are continuing to shop for different brands and have started buying more non-food items.

Physical Health 
•  We are seeing an increase from 39% to 41% of community members reporting that they are exercising less during lockdown.
•  The number of people exercising less has increased across all our communities – with the biggest decrease in exercise coming in Italy.
•  While many are exercising less, there are also those exercising more during lockdown, with many moving to online fitness classes. 

Social Distancing and Isolation 
•  Social distancing is becoming harder as people miss their families and friends. In week four, the pressure and fatigue of lockdown is increasing significantly. 
•  Despite this, we continue to observe a number of positives – spending more time with family being the top of the list.
•  Feelings of being trapped, isolated and bored are most common across all of our global communities. 

‘New Normal’ 
•  We are seeing more people trying a new diet or simply exploring new meals or recipes at home.
• Leveraging technology (video calls, PC, online streaming) remains high across all our communities – especially for
connecting with family and friends.
• We have seen an increase in users engaging in new pastimes – reading and audiobooks have been particularly prevalent, especially in the US, UK, Italy and France.
•  Online fitness classes have been gaining more traction too , in particular in the UK, US, Brazil and France.

Work 
•  Concerns about unemployment and financial instability are rising. The level of people not working is still increasing in most of our global communities (only Brazil and France have experienced a decline).
• We have observed a very high incline in users ‘working less than before’ in Italy – from 22% up to 50%.
•  Working from home remains a constant theme, though we have now seen some variation: 
– In Italy, people are now working less from home (this could be linked to a rise in those not working) – moving from 39% to 13%.
– In Brazil, France and US the numbers of those working from home continues to rise 

Our Covid-19 Tracker charts the changing daily attitudes and behaviours of 1000s of global consumers – capturing real customer voice and forecasting future consumer trends.

Mental Health 
•  Anxiety remains high – at an average of 73% across our communities. This can be worst felt in Brazil where infection and death rates continue to rise. 
•  We have observed a marginal drop in negative sentiment on anecdotal responses for the first time, as people begin to see a light at the end of the tunnel and the easing of lockdown is beginning to be discussed across some communities. 
•  Concerns about family members catching the virus remains the most significant fear. However, financial worries and job insecurity is also on the rise. 

Shopping 
•  Online shopping continues across the majority of our communities. 
•  Stockpiling continues to decline.
•  Long-life products, canned good and everyday essentials remain the most common items in the basket – with people continuing to shop for alternative brands where their staple purchases are not available.  

Physical Health 
•  People continue to exercise less – with an average 41% of users reporting a reduction in their exercise routine. 
•  Despite this, anecdotal responses have reported many users finding new ways to adapt exercise to the lockdown measures – with online workouts being widely used. 

Work 
•  Those not working remains high – with a significant increase observed this week in Brazil. 
•  Users working from home also continues to be significant, with many reporting the benefits of remote working solutions and not having to visit the office. 

‘New Normal’ 
•  Behaviour changes remain largely inline with previous weeks:
• Leveraging technology (video calls, PC, online streaming) remains significant across all our communities.
• Engaging in other, more traditional pastimes such as cooking, reading and crafting is also on the rise. 
• We have observed an increase in users subscribing to online education platforms – particularly in the UK and Italy.
• The use of online food delivery companies has also experienced spikes across our UK, Brazilian and French communities. 

Social Distancing and Isolation 
•  We are beginning to observe increased feelings of pressure around lockdown, with isolation fatigue setting in and much negative sentiment being reported around not seeing an end to the crisis. 
•  Despite this, we continue to observe a number of positives – with spending more time with family continuing to be at the top of the list of good things to come out of lockdown.