We are all impacted by hammers and nails, although we usually don’t think much about them. Think about it or not, we are all dependent on nails to hold things together. Nails have been found in archeological digs in Egypt dating back to 3400 B.C. Very little has changed about nails over five millennia. However, nails are useless unless you have a hammer to drive them into two pieces of building materials to fasten them together. Hammers are essential to nails. One without the other is inadequate. If it weren’t for the crucial role hammers and nails play in your world, the building you are sitting in would just be a pile of lumber, wall sheetrock, floor coverings, roofing shingles and a sundry of other building materials sitting on dirt!

There has been a lot of talk about essential and non-essential business lately. After determining who stayed open for business and who closed their doors during the recent pandemic, we quickly found out that some jobs, either considered irrelevant or were just invisible to most folks, turned out to be extremely important to our economy. That has led to a lot of rethinking about the indispensable parts of business, especially those that you depend upon to give what you do its value. Any time there is a shift in thinking about what is important, marketing needs to be activated.

What are your nails? What is the unseen essential in your business? It is time to make that known to your customers. Why? Because they need some assurance that they will be able to get what you are offering without a break in your supply line. Look, something as simple as toilet paper and hand sanitizer have been in short supply. (Have you seen the social media videos of people fighting in retail stores over these items?) Why have these goods been in short stock? The supply lines for them were disrupted. Your customers are wondering about other supply lines as well. Put their minds at ease. Let your marketing reassure them that you won’t stop supplying what they need from you. What are some other concealed but vital facets of your business? Now that we live in a heightened germ-aware society, the way your establishment is cleaned may be one of the most marketable and hidden aspects of your business. So is financial viability. Once only considered a marketing necessity of the financial industry, customers are now wondering how many post-pandemic businesses will remain shuttered. Your financial stability is key to effective marketing in an economy halted by a shutdown. Stability sells well after a storm. Identify your unseen essentials to doing business and market these to your customers.

What is your hammer? Hammers are the seemingly insignificant business practices and services that make your business effective. In your company, that may be your delivery methods that take products to the customer or the way you package your products to protect them from contamination. It also could be the way you schedule a job or the efficiencies you practice to keep your costs down. Right now, these "insignificant” parts of doing business are being seen as just the opposite: they are getting the spotlight put on them. They are being noticed and you should market them to your customers.

Marketing is ever changing, but more so after a shift in doing business, such as we have just experienced. Take a look at the hidden and routine aspects of your business that are truly irreplaceable. Showcase these essential components of your business, no matter how small, because no one is seeing them as irrelevant right now.