Tips for Holiday Marketing with Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest
Holidays are often the most important time of the year for many of our clients. We always see an influx of sales from paid social and search, even for smaller occasions like Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day. Our clients lean on us as the experts to guide the strategy, creative, and timeline for these holidays and it is important to be thorough and on top of it.
Here are our top tips for making the most of every occasion and ensuring revenue and sales are maximized from Paid Social (FB, IG, & Pinterest) leading up to a holiday.
Utilize past purchase data. This is the first step we always turn to that doesn’t take much time, but gives you a bigger picture of purchase trends. Using Google Analytics to get a quick snapshot, it is easy to see what a customer’s purchase behavior is for a specific brand. Maybe bigger purchases are made in advance, whereas smaller fun gifts are more of a last-minute grab. Or maybe customers are aware of longer shipping times so need to act sooner. Whatever it is, get an idea of the average number of days you see increased sales when leading up to a holiday.
Scale your budget. No matter where your holiday falls within the month, scale up on your budget in the timeframe leading up to the holiday, sale, or event. Especially for holidays with sales such as Black Friday, many customers will hold off and shop during the sale and are less likely to purchase the first week of the month. Save the budget for when you need it most and decrease it afterwards when you will likely see a drop-off.
Start early. Hype ads, hype ads, hype ads. They work. Thank you latent attribution. Yes, your sales will likely be lower in the days leading up to a sale, but if it is on someone’s radar early, you have a better chance of influencing a purchase. Back to Black Friday. Even if your sale isn’t until the week of, it benefits to start messaging the week before so you are able to reach more customers over a longer period of time to ensure you get their attention and they remember to return to your site. The earlier you get to them, the less noise and competition you will face. Additionally, gift shopping occurs during such a large window even for smaller holidays. Let someone know you are a great shop for a Mother’s Day gift and let them go ahead and check that off their list 3 weeks prior. Less stress = happier customers.
Target the opposite gender. With so many gifting holidays, this is the perfect opportunity to tell someone’s husband, father, mother, etc about what they need to get for their significant other, special someone, or friend. For example, we always market to an acquisition and remarketing men’s audience for our jewelry client and always get over a 10 to 1 return leading up to Christmas, Valentine’s Day, and Mother’s Day.
Say it straight. Tell people why your product is a good gift. Use testimonials. Let women tell other women that it is the best blanket they have ever laid upon them or that your product is something “every woman needs.” That will grab the attention and your website and reviews can do the rest. You don’t need to tell a male shopper all the benefits of your brand and why it is better than competitors. If you tell them their wife needs it, chances are they will go for it – easy peasy.
Self-gifting is great. Everyone faces guilt when shopping for gifts and finding something they love and want for themselves. Get slick with it and tell them to wrap it and put it under the tree from themselves and that nobody will know. Sometimes they just need that extra little convincing. Plus, so many people love picking out something they know they will want and love versus leaving it to luck.
Convey shipping or sale cutoffs. Let people know how long they have to purchase and add a sense of urgency. There is nothing worse than getting to checkout and seeing that your purchase won’t arrive in time. Have a physical location? Add language around ordering online and picking up in-store up until the holiday itself.
These tips will have you on your way to the next most successful holiday campaign. Your client will be impressed with your proactiveness and thrilled with positive results. After all - happy client, happy company!