7 Steps to a Very Merry Holiday Campaign

Tis’ the season for joy, glistening lights, and hot coco (or gluhwein here at WSI). As the holidays approach, businesses are scrambling to finalize their holiday campaigns. For those who have their offers and campaigns scheduled out, you’re golden – just use this blog as a checklist to make sure you didn’t miss any promotion opportunities. For our procrastinator friends, don’t fret! We kept the list fairly straightforward and simple so you can put together a great campaign as fast as Santa’s trip around the world (seriously how does he do it in one night?).

1. Create a Promotion that Sleighs

There’s nothing better than a great deal that doesn’t break the business bank. Whatever you decide, make sure it makes sense for your wallet and your customer’s. Some commons ideas include:

• Discounts on products, services, experiences. Consumers love a good sale. You can discount single items or orders over a certain dollar amount. Consider bundling popular items and offering a deal. Buy one get one (half off) is another great offer. Evaluate what makes sense for your specific business.
• Offer samples. We love samples. They’re a great way to give consumers a taste of your other offerings. Consider adding a free sample to a gift item or bundle.
• Memberships offers. If your business offers memberships, try a first week/month free or discounted. You can also offer special deals on quarterly or annual memberships. This is another great way to lure in customers and get them hooked on your offerings.
• Gift cards (experience gift cards are the best!). Consumers appreciate this flexible gift. And if you offer experiences, even better! Experiences have become one of the most popular gifts. In hospitality? You can offer hotel stays, tours, and flights. Much better than a pair of wool socks – again.
• Try virtual. This year, virtual went big. And it will probably continue to be big well into 2021. Are you able to offer a virtual experience? Try it out. Folks can gift an experience to loved ones and create a truly memorable moment (think, gifting a virtual tasting from a winery).

2. Create the Perfect Landing Page for all Marketing Efforts

Be sure users convert once they land on your website. Create a beautiful landing page that highlights your offers, allows for purchase right on the page (or at least provides clear contact info), and offers text details, imagery, and testimonials. This page will be essential to all your marketing efforts as customers will land on it from social media marketing posts, email campaigns, advertisements, links from supporting blogs, etc.

In addition to website design, make page speed a priority to ensure users don’t wait long and bounce. Contact your developer ASAP as you will need the landing page complete before turning on any marketing tasks.

3. Blog About It

Go beyond creating a landing page and sharing the link. Write a blog too and link back to your landing page. This is a great SEO tactic to adopt whenever you want to promote something. Be sure to give the blog to your SEO company too so they can do their optimization magic. Post the blog on your website, share it on social media and email campaigns.

A blog can help create buzz and excitement. Use it as a chance to dive into your holiday offering – why it’s a great gift idea, who it would be great for, etc. When you share it on social, boost it too. Put a few dollars towards ensuring it reaches all your followers (remember Facebook only shows business page posts to a very small percent of your followers).

4. Share on Social Media

We touched on this a little bit. But it’s more than just sharing a link or creating a pretty post for social media marketing. Have you ever used Facebook’s “Offers” feature? It’s free to add offers to your Facebook business page, and you can then run ads to that offer or boost it. And Facebook loves showing ads that lead users to a Facebook tool (like “offers” or “events”).

5. Send an Email

You probably noticed your inbox exploding in holiday offers. You may have even found some great deals and gift ideas too. Add your offer to the bunch. Use your existing email list – so many businesses underutilize this FREE marketing opportunity.

If you send out a monthly newsletter, include your offer in there too. You can also create an email marketing campaign specifically for promoting your holiday offer so consumers can focus on it completely. Create some marketing automation flows depending on how your audience acted, like abandoned cart emails (maybe with an additional offer to make the sale).

6. Run an Ad Campaign

Advertising is a great tool to reach new audiences or audiences that have already shown an interest in your business. And social media advertising is the perfect avenue to reach online shoppers – the secret of course being you already ran traffic campaigns leading up to the holidays so you can guide folks down the funnel and find an audience that is likely to convert. If you haven’t done this, run a traffic campaign ASAP (like right now and in parallel to your holiday campaign ad).

When it comes to Facebook and Instagram ads, they perform best when they already have data to work with. Ensure your Facebook pixel is installed and that you are tracking contacts, view content, add to cart, initiate checkout, and purchase. After installing and tracking pixel events, run simple traffic campaigns to get folks to your website. This will come in handy later when you want to target website visitors who haven’t completed a purchase.

And something to seriously note: it’s likely your holiday audience will be different than your year-round audience. Holiday audiences are people looking to gift your target audience. Think about how this affects demographics when setting up your ads. Not an ad pro? Our advertising agency can help.

7. Add a Holiday Spin to Everything

Now more than ever, people want the cozy feeling of the holidays. Many spent the year isolated and now crave the love and joy of the season. Be sure to use holiday-inspired creatives in your ads, social media posts, email campaigns, website design, and anywhere else. This includes colors, fonts, and tasteful holiday design elements. Get in the holiday spirit – no one likes a Grinch.

It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

While chestnuts roast on an open fire and Jack Frost nips at your nose, businesses will be incredible busy, stressed, and hopefully delighted with holiday sales. Overall, holiday sales have averaged about 19 percent of annual retail sales (NRF.com). This varies for other industries, but the fact remains, this season is incredibly important. Are you prepared to launch a holiday campaign that brings Joy to the World and your customers? Just follow the steps listed above and you’re sure to please consumers this coming month.

And Happy Holidays from all of us at WSI Next Gen Marketing! We wish you a safe holiday season and prosperous New Year!