The Yearly Guide to Holidays and Marketing

Side view of a couple doing some window shopping at christmas. The mid adult male has his arm around the mid adult female and they are talking about wats in the window.

The holiday season is approaching, and from October through January, each month brings at least one major holiday. As a business owner, you have an excellent opportunity to capitalize on the festive, happy feelings of your customers. Taking advantage of the holidays for radio marketing and digital arketing is always a good strategy. Yet without the right plan, you could miss this opportunity. Now is the time to start preparing and thinking about your holiday marketing campaigns. Here are some strategies you can use to maximize your marketing efforts throughout the holidays.

How to Build a Holiday Marketing Campaign

Are you hoping to take advantage of the holiday season more effectively this year? Here are some guidelines to follow as you learn how to market your business for the holidays.

Identify your overall goal for the campaign

The first step in planning is setting a goal. Do you want more foot traffic to your store? Do you want more sales? Are you hoping to build brand awareness? Your goal is unique to your business, and the entire campaign is tied to the goal.

Look at past campaigns

Next, look at any holiday marketing campaigns you ran in the past, and see if they worked. Did you get the results you wanted? Do you see areas where you could improve? Take advantage of what you did well, and make plans to overcome what you did not, as you move forward.

Focus on your audience

Before starting your campaign, determine who your audience is. Who are you trying to sell to for the various holidays? Is it moms planning the perfect Thanksgiving feast, or dads hoping to snag a great electronic steal on Black Friday? Outline their motivations, hesitations, and concerns as they relate to the holiday shopping season.

Once you’ve defined your audience and what excites them, determine where your audience spends their time. Are they into Facebook? Or are they more likely to spend time on Instagram? What types of offers would they be most interested in? Think about where your audience spends time when choosing radio stations and digital marketing channels.

Show your audience how you can deliver a unique gift or the perfect experience this holiday season, and give them a reason to buy from you rather than a competitor.

Develop a theme for the campaign

Across your advertising channels, have a cohesive, holiday-based theme. The theme, whether it’s a song or a slogan, needs to be catchy and needs to capture the spirit of the holiday.

Develop an offer

Finally, give people a reason to do business with you. You know your theme and your customers’ desires. Deliver something to them that meets those desires and fits within your theme. The offer must be appealing to drive results quickly and capitalize on this feel-good time of year.

Upcoming Holidays and Campaign Ideas

So what holidays are coming up, and what can you do to get people thinking about your business? The most popular upcoming holidays include:

• Halloween
• Thanksgiving
• Black Friday
• Christmas
• Boxing Day
• New Year’s Eve

So how can you creatively market to these holidays? Here are some fresh ideas:

• Create a branded holiday hashtag – If people tag their holiday photos with your brand, you win. Come up with a holiday hashtag that people will want to use, and incorporate a part of your brand into it, then encourage people to use it.
• Run a holiday-themed contest – Put a big prize out there that’s connected to the holiday. Then, encourage entries in a way that helps you with your goals. Don’t forget to gather data, like an email address or phone number, from those who enter.
• Picture contest – Have people send in pictures of themselves or their family from the holiday, and have a prize for the winning picture.
• Guessing game – For in-business marketing, fill a jar with a holiday-themed item, like candy or jingle bells, and have people come to your location to take their guess as to how many!

The holidays are an excellent time to drive more people to your business and increase your revenue, but you need to have the right marketing campaign to do so successfully. Use these steps and ideas to help you with your holiday marketing goals every year.