The blog

COVID-19 has literally turned our world upside down over the past few weeks and is calling on us to change – a lot! From staying home and having video calls with your children interrupting to online yoga classes and… adapting your communication strategy. Here are our four key takeaways of things you should definitely look out for nowadays.

Diegem, 21 avril 2020 – « En tant qu’entreprise de consultance en marketing de référence, nous croyons au principe du “practice what you preach”. Notre objectif est de garantir une valeur client optimale à l’aide de services adéquats, par lesquels nous réinventons continuellement notre offre », déclare Lies Taerwe, Client Service Director chez The House of Marketing & Upthrust. Le fait que la pandémie actuelle de COVID-19 ait un impact significatif sur les entreprises et l’économie dans son ensemble est un euphémisme. En réaction à cette crise, The House of Marketing et sa société sœur Upthrust lancent 8 nouveaux « Acceleration Sprints ». Chacun d’eux comprend conseils et soutien en marketing, adaptés aux besoins actuels de l’entreprise. Les résultats quantifiables de ces sprints permettent non seulement aux entreprises de protéger leurs activités, mais aussi de les stimuler et peut-être plus important encore : de les préparer au futur.

Diegem, 21 april 2020 – “Als leading marketing consultancybedrijven geloven we sterk in het principe van ‘practice what you preach’. We streven naar een optimale customer value aan de hand van relevante diensten, waardoor we ons aanbod voortdurend heruitvinden”, aldus Lies Taerwe, Client Service Director bij The House of Marketing & Upthrust.  Dat de huidige COVID-19 pandemie een zware impact heeft op bedrijven en de algehele economie is een understatement. Als reactie op die crisis lanceren The House of Marketing en zusterbedrijf Upthrust 8 nieuwe ‘Acceleration Sprints’. Elke sprint omvat marketingsupport en -advies dat aangepast is aan de huidige bedrijfsnoden. De meetbare resultaten van die sprints stellen bedrijven in staat hun business niet alleen te beschermen, maar ook te boosten en misschien nog belangrijker: voor te bereiden op de toekomst.  Voor dit nieuwe initiatief slaan The House of Marketing, al twee decennia een toonaangevende speler in strategisch marketingconsultancy- en interimmanagement, en digital acceleratiebureau Upthrust de handen in elkaar. De sterkte van die samenwerking ligt in de complementariteit van beide bedrijven: strategische business marketeers en digitale experten bouwen op elkaars kennis en expertise van future-proof marketing.   De 8 sprints houden marketingsupport en -advies op maat in, aangepast aan de huidige omstandigheden. Ze worden opgedeeld in 2 groepen, met korte of lange termijnimpact. De focus van de sprints is uiteenlopend: customer retention, online zichtbaarheid & sales, online conversion, data, innovatie, ideeënvalidatie, agile marketing en digitale transformatie 2.0.  

People are slowly getting used to a new way of living where walking from the kitchen to the living room has become the new commute to work and a-walk-in-the-park has become the #1 city trip destination. In the meantime, some are already daring to think ahead and asking the question ‘Will this self-isolation change our consumer behavior in the long term?’ Will we continue to cocoon at home, buy locally and limit all unnecessary travel? Or will we quickly fall back into old habits and go out, order a book from a multinational located on the other side of the planet and book a city trip to Tel Aviv because the hummus is simply way better there?! Let’s look at some key changes to our lives today in quarantine. Based on consumer research and some early learnings from China we will look ahead to predict what the impact on the long term could be. While data of consumers predicting their future behavior should be looked at with caution, and there are clear cultural differences between China and Belgium, there are still interesting trends worth analyzing.

It is no mystery that there is a very big shift in customer behavior and this phenomenon impacts every business in every industry. Customers are increasingly more demanding, wanting companies to be where they are, to communicate when they want it and how they want it. All of this triggered by the internet and the convenience of digitization. Being relevant for customers has never been more challenging and forces companies to become really customer-centric. Follow our 10-step roadmap to unique customer-centric Value Propositions based on the Business Design Thinking phases.

Voice Technology is everywhere. More than half of U.S. adults have used voice commands and that number keeps growing every day. Belgian consumers are also signing up for it. According to a study by Wavemaker, more than 29% of Belgians used a voice assistant in 2019. It makes perfect sense. The technology itself keeps improving and the possibilities keep expanding every day. But despite the growing popularity among consumers, VoiceTech adoption in the office is still limited. This could have several causes, such as the rise of the open workspace and a lack of privacy amongst colleagues. These limitations disappear however in our home office, where Voice Technology can inject some real added value to your (work)day. These challenging times are an ideal moment to give it a try.  Before introducing you to some great VoiceTech tools, let us take you through the different types of devices on which they can be used: 

The recent announcement by the Belgian government that the coronavirus containment measures would be extended by two more weeks goes to show that this is an ever evolving crisis. In a previous article, we predicted a significant boost in online sales, due to the closure of most physical stores. Today, Belgian e-commerce is going through its maturity phase, which is proven by the growing number of new market players and the creation of valuable customer experiences. We’re  doing everything possible to make e-commerce grow and mature, and therefore expect an even more sustainable growth in the long term. While we see the numbers of e-sales increasing, there have been a few phenomena standing in the way of the success of e-commerce worldwide – think of retailers being overwhelmed by requests for collect services or IKEA’s announcement about their limited webshop offer. In this post, we identify possible blocking factors for e-commerce, divided into 2 main groups: operations & customer expectations. In addition, we share tips for webshop owners to survive during and after these challenging times.

The newly launched E-commerce Barometer 2019 confirmed a positive trend in Belgian e-commerce. The Belgian e-commerce market accounted for no less than 8.2 billion euros of online revenue in 2019, representing a sharp increase of 17% compared to 2018. This significant growth trend first set in 3 years ago. Due to strict measures limiting offline operations in response to the current corona crisis, we expect the number of online sales to grow even faster. But how does our performance compare to our neighboring countries? Our neighboring countries are also on a growth trajectory. A look at the table below tells us that we still achieved a stronger growth percentage compared to some neighboring countries, which means that Belgium is certainly on the right track. This positive trend clearly shows that e-commerce is becoming a fully-fledged part of the economy and therefore has a significant impact on it. It has changed the overall profit and cost structure of companies and brought about a shift in the interaction and engagement between buyers and sellers.

Events are canceled, schools have suspended classes and (most) physical stores are keeping their doors closed: social distancing is the new black. As the COVID-19 virus spreads rapidly throughout Europe and within Belgium, companies are compelled to take responsibility and adapt to the situation. But what's the impact of the virus commotion on e-commerce? Julie Luppens, one of the e-commerce experts at The House of Marketing, expects e-commerce in Belgium to boom these next few weeks/months, partly due to various actions online businesses are taking. We first look into those measures, before discussing 3 trends identified in the recently launched E-commerce Barometer 2019 – and how they will evolve in times of COVID-19.

With COVID-19 spreading rapidly through Europe and Belgium, businesses are increasingly impacted.  In light of this evolution, we're sharing an update on measurements from our side.​ Since March 3rd, we’ve put the following actions into place, in addition to governmental regulations: ​