Consumer Perceptions of Marketing Communications During Crisis Situations

Businesses need to retain long-term relationships with their customers. However, crisis creates uncertainty and consumers change consumption behavior, usually reducing expenditure for non-essentials. Much of the little work on marketing communications during crisis recommends keeping up efforts to push sales. However, this can damage relationships, and such strategies can cause firms to lose when the crisis eventually eases. We used 15 qualitative in-depth interviews among middle class consumers of fine jewelry in Bangkok to explore thinking about crisis situations and response to how firms managed communications during the crisis. The interviews show that communications aiming to reassure customers and show ways to cope build positive perceptions of the company. As the crisis eases, communications can gradually shift back toward a more sales-oriented approach. By then customers have formed strong perceptions about who “cares about us” and who does not, and “we all could remember who helped us”. We propose a progression of communication objectives through three stages of the crisis, which aim at gaining positive emotional response, then positive cognitive response, and eventually, once the crisis is over, purchase intention again