12 October 2012

Holiday Marketing Online!

Original Blog Posted: 21 Oct 2012

Posted on October 2, 2012 by Steve
With more and more business taking place online, internet based businesses will need to do business more like brick and mortar operations. This means identifying peak business times and focusing their sales and marketing efforts accordingly. As such, the holidays are a time of the year that is especially important. The opportunity to produce a final revenue surge to close the year, while also locking in new and loyal customers is too valuable to ignore. Here are five important tips for holiday marketing online.

Plan Your Promotions Accordingly
Online businesses should have a schedule to coincide with the holidays. Having special promotions can help to attract traffic and set one business apart from the others. It should go without saying that most business leading up to Thanksgiving should prepare customers for a special promotion of some sort on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving.
This promotion should be the largest one of the season. Necessary measures should also be in place to ensure proper customer support and maximum site up time.

Begin Collecting Emails and Marketing to Them
A promotion cannot be successful if it goes unseen. Running display ads on other websites can help to push promotions and special offers, but the return on investment is lower than most would like.
It is important to collect emails throughout the year. Once emails are captured, it is important to set a schedule for promoting special offers and products to that email list.
It is important to get maximum value from an email list without abusing it. With that said, during the holiday season, promotions may be increased to improve the chances of competing with competitors for email inbox space. Emails should become more frequent before a major promotion is set to launch, such as Black Friday.

Surprise Customers With a Discount in Exchange For a Promotion of Some Sort
Social media can be very powerful in this case. Telling your visitors that they can get a discount or even expedited shipping if they “like” or “tweet” your products, can be a great way to further your marketing reach.

During the holidays, when consumers are looking for trustworthy and reliable retailers to buy from, that social vote can generate a lot of traffic that already has some trust built in from their friend’s endorsement.

Use Remarketing in Your Advertising Campaigns

Creating Google AdWords campaigns can be expensive, especially for buying keywords during the holidays. A better way to run advertisements is to use the Google AdWords remarketing tool.

Other networks may also have a similar tool if AdWords is not appropriate for a particular market.

This tool lets a site owner show ads only to those who have already been on their site. The increase in visibility can give smaller businesses an advantage over larger businesses. Remarketing gives small brands the opportunity to appear to be bigger than they actually are. It is also much cheaper than the typical AdWords campaign based on bidding for ad space.

Be Charitable
The holidays are hopefully when most people feel blessed in one way or another. Pledging a portion of each sale to a charity can help to humanize your business, while also staying with the holiday spirit of giving.
This is a good practice that can help to build trust and loyalty, while doing a wonderful deed, throughout the year. Making a donation to a specific charity focused on the holidays can be beneficial for your business, as well as those helped by the charity.
This is likely to be a bit controversial to some, but the positive impact for those in need should not go unnoticed.

Bonus Gift Tip
Update your site design to reflect the holidays. Hire a designer to integrate appropriate holiday themed graphics and images into the site design. Instead of the standard website theme, create a festive mood with seasonal design changes.

Be Prepared For Success
Following tips like these will help any business to be better prepared to market during the holidays on the internet. The holidays are a joyous time and a great time to make more money. Prepare your company for the rush of sales, and enjoy every minute of the season.