Today, businesses have become more reliant than ever on digital.

And in many cases, it will be the deciding factor in whether they make it through the tough times ahead.

The unprecedented, almost-total, disappearance of all channels related to face-to-face business pose an enormous challenge. Key to resilience is the development of adaptive solutions to mitigate against this loss.

Companies in industries that are not digital-native may be less sophisticated in their digital growth and customer engagement strategies. For smaller businesses especially, used to getting new customers through word-of-mouth referrals or on the strength of a hard-won reputation, their loss is coming as a shock.

Larger companies are also now finding themselves in the position of having potentially lost millions through disrupted revenue streams. They won’t claw back the hours of time and expense spent on customer development for this year. Businesses and organizations – including ones that did not even have a social media presence before – will need to move quickly to digital.

A key factor in resilience is adaptability. If it’s standard for you to meet new clients and customers face-to-face before you do business, adapting may mean opening new channels over Web or social media platforms where introductions can be made and relationships fostered. In the coming months, your prospective clients and customers are going to be less agreeable to the idea of letting you walk through the door and shake their hand – and no-one really has any idea how long this will last and whether this will lead to longer-term change.

These are uncertain times, and with the increase of remote working and a collaborative approach, more and more businesses are turning to and embracing digital. There has been a real spike during the last few weeks from businesses wishing to create or update Websites, launch new e-commerce channels, create social media campaigns, and use SEO to reach new audiences.

With stay-at-home guidelines, independent professionals, businesses owners, marketers, and fundraising managers have more time to develop adaptive strategies. This means researching where your customers can be found online, and how different approaches and tactics might impact your success. If your organization previously put token efforts into digital channels – because like a lot of other businesses, you had built your operation on offline strategies and that had always seemed to work – now is the time to rethink them. That could be as simple as giving your Website a refresh or a more enhanced upgrade.

Owners, marketers, and managers are looking for cost-effective ways to spend their limited marketing budgets. And due to the current Covid-19 crisis, they are willing to take another look at this “digital” thing.

If they see the benefits and opportunities that digital channels can offer, it will become part of their long-term marketing playbook.

It’s certainly true that the coming weeks (months, or longer) will be a challenging time for any business or organization that isn’t ready to think about how they will replace the opportunities that have been lost.

As long as you approach the shift to digital marketing strategically, there’s no reason why it would be seen just as an emergency fill-in, but rather a smart and adaptive tool providing long-term value when the world eventually gets back to (the new) normal. And of course, it would make your business or organization more resilient to deal with any changing economic characteristics including future pandemics.