Get Out Your Jingle Bells!
Three Ways to Start Marketing Early for the Holidays
Valentine J. Brkich, Editor
Now that summer has come to an end (and not a minute too soon, in my opinion), business owners need to shift gears and start thinking about—you guessed it—Christmas!
I know, I know…we’ve barely breached pumpkin-spice season, and here I am talking about the holidays. How can you possibly think about Christmas when it’s still 80-plus degrees outside?
If you’re a business owner, a successful holiday season means planning early and getting a jump on things long before Black Friday comes around. Wait until November to begin your holiday marketing, and you’ll fall behind and get lost in the mix. The key is to get your customers thinking about your business for their holiday shopping without bombarding them with premature Christmassy messaging. (Apparently, only Halloween, which started showing up in stores in July, is permitted to inundate us with its spooky merch months ahead of time.)
With that in mind, here are three clever ways you can get a jump on the holiday shopping season:
1.) Spotlight a “Gift Idea of the Week.”
Each week on the same day, showcase a different gift idea on your social media accounts and email blasts. If you have a brick-and-mortar store, consider showcasing a featured gift of the week. You can then add a “Holiday Gift Ideas” page on your website. Even if you’re not a retailer, you can still spotlight early-bird discounts on your various services.
TIP: Just don’t mention the “C” or “H” words just yet. Some people—I won’t mention any names—can get a little anxious when you mention the BIG DAY before the temps drop below fifty. And, please, no Christmas music until after Thanksgiving. There are only so many times I can hear that Mariah Carey song before my head explodes.
2.) Offer an Early-Bird Incentive Program.
When I was a kid, retail giant Kmart (Google it, kids) offered an interest-free layaway program, where customers could pick an item and then let the store hold the merchandise in a back room until it was paid in full. The genius of the program was that it got people thinking about the holidays early and committing to purchases months in advance.
TIP: You could offer a similar program today, or simply offer your customers a discount if they choose to do their holiday shopping early. Just don’t try to replicate Kmart’s “Blue Light Special.” Nowadays, a blaring siren and flashing blue light might send your customers fleeing your store in a panic. Oh, how I long for the 1980s…
3.) Use This Time to Pre-Plan Your Holiday Social-Media Marketing.
The last thing you want to do during the busy holiday season is sit behind your computer and try to come up with compelling social media content. Instead, use October to pre-plan your social media posts and have them all ready to go come November.
TIP: Write posts that link to articles about “great gift ideas” or “what to get for the man/woman who has everything.” In other words, forget the cutesy cat videos and give your customers something they can actually use. Save the cat videos for the dark days of February, when we’re all bored to death from cabin fever.
The bottom line: don’t procrastinate! Christmas is just around the corner. Make sure that, when the holiday shopping season officially kicks off, your customers are putting you at the top of their lists!
FINAL TIP: And please don’t put up the Christmas lights yet. Unless, that is, you drape them over that 12-foot-tall skeleton in your front yard. Apparently, that’s now acceptable.