You have most likely noticed a few Christmas adverts on the TV and plenty of Christmas items in the shops already, but is your business prepared for the festive season ahead? Have you got your marketing strategy in place?
It’s good practice to have your Christmas marketing campaign ready to go several months before December as, just like you, your customers will be planning ahead. 38% of buyers start doing their Christmas shopping in October1, so now is the time to convince people that your brand has what they’re looking for!
One of the most significant reasons not to leave your Christmas marketing strategy to the last minute is that it takes time to do the necessary research and preparation to plan your campaign effectively.
It is essential to decipher how your potential customers will behave, for example: When will they start shopping? What will encourage them to buy your products?
A great way to get the insight you need into your customers’ Christmas shopping habits is by using Google Analytics to determine how your customers have behaved during previous years.
If you already have a Google Analytics account set up, you’ll be able to look into the number of website visits you had, how many sales were made, and you will even be able to find out where the traffic originated, for example, via social media, pay-per-click ads or Google searches2.
By determining which traffic sources have previously worked best, you can concentrate on these to generate your conversions this Christmas.
Once you have adequate data to develop a marketing plan, you can put together a strategic statement of intent detailing your objectives, how you plan to achieve them, what your customers will be looking for and which social media channels, ads and webpages result in the most conversions.
Your goals should follow the SMART acronym: specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time-limited.
A wide range of industries will be impacted by the Christmas period, so whether you offer heating services and want to smartly tailor your social media presence to the festive season, or you run an online gift shop, there are ways to make your brand relevant this Christmas.
As people prioritise spending money on decorations, presents and food over the Christmas period, it would be advantageous to hold a sale on your eCommerce site or use discount codes to encourage people to make purchases.
Christmas poses the perfect opportunity to get creative on social media by giving your posts a Christmassy edge. This could be through sharing tips related to your services, such as, “How to keep fit this Christmas” for a fitness brand. Or you could be more playful with this, depending on the voice/message of your brand. For example, you could share a poll to determine what your followers want to find under the Christmas tree on the big day.
For eCommerce businesses, social media is an invaluable means of driving conversions by linking your audience to your site via social media posts. So don’t forget to include that all-important hyperlink and a call to action such as “find out more:” to encourage people to click.
Although it’s great to link your posts back to your brand and services, to avoid a hard sell approach which can be quite off-putting to followers, sharing several Christmas posts that engage your audience rather than solely promote your brand could help you connect with your followers and their interests. Balancing these types of posts with promotional posts is an excellent way of boosting engagement while maintaining your brand identity.
If you feel like you don’t have the resources or time to make the most of social media’s marketing power, feel free to contact us to have our team prepare and post engaging content for you.
It is also worth optimising your website’s content by tailoring product descriptions to terms customers are likely to use for Christmas shopping.
For example, if you sell custom t-shirts, you could either add additional products under a Christmas category on your site or update the product descriptions of relevant existing items to include terms like ‘Christmas Gifts’ or ‘Christmas T-Shirts’.
Targeted keyword placement will help improve your rankings in search engines and increase traffic to your website.
You may benefit from an audit of your website. Our SEO professionals can help deliver this to determine how your site is likely to perform over the Christmas period and how to boost sales by optimising content.
We hope this article helps you kickstart your Christmas marketing campaign and you have a successful season of sales!
1Retail Computer Solutions (2015). When do most people start shopping for Christmas?. [online] Available at:http://www.rcs-uk.com/people-start-shopping-for-christmas/ [Accessed 10 Oct. 2019].
2Stevens, W. (2018). Preparing a Christmas marketing plan for your small business - Blog. [online] Studio by UXPin. Available at: https://uk.godaddy.com/blog/preparing-a-christmas-marketing-plan-for-your-small-business/ [Accessed 10 Oct. 2019].
Digital Marketer
Amy joined the Digital Marketing team at Blue Frontier in April 2019. Following graduation from University in 2018, she has accumulated experience writing content for social media and articles on subjects including AI, Smart Technology, Cybersecurity and IoT. She is interested in writing about a diverse range of topics and enjoys the versatility of her role at Blue Frontier.
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