{"id":5749,"date":"2015-11-30T06:22:31","date_gmt":"2015-11-30T11:22:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.invespcro.com\/blog\/?p=5749"},"modified":"2015-11-30T06:22:31","modified_gmt":"2015-11-30T11:22:31","slug":"holiday-marketing-strategies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.invespcro.com\/blog\/holiday-marketing-strategies\/","title":{"rendered":"Holiday Marketing Strategies: 11 Tactics Every Small Business Should Leverage"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading Time: <\/span> 12<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>

We recently worked with a partner client who is located in India.<\/p>\n

Now if you are familiar with Indian culture, you\u2019d know that they have a lot of holidays. Like, all the time.<\/p>\n

Between Muslim and Hindu holidays, there is always some sort of holiday marketing that needs to take place.<\/p>\n

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Luckily, much of the world takes breathers between major holidays. In the US, October to December are hot months for many retailers.<\/p>\n

Once the retailer has done their due diligence of getting enough eyeballs to their website (which generally increases for most of our clients organically during these \u201chot\u201d months), how then do you convince the visitor that this is the product that they need to buy?<\/p>\n

And is this the right time to be testing?<\/p>\n

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There\u2019s no doubt that visitors to your site on the holidays are pretty motivated, which means they\u2019ll many times overlook some elements that trigger FUDs (Fears, Uncertainties, and Doubts<\/a>).<\/p>\n

We call this\u00a0holiday motivation<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

However, all retailers are pretty aware of this fact, so customers who are holiday shoppers are constantly and excessively bombarded with all kinds of incentives. How do you cut through all the noise and not oversell a pretty \u201coversold to\u201d visitor?<\/p>\n

ALSO READ: Staying on brand with promotions and discounts<\/a><\/p>\n

Over the years we\u2019ve come up with a few tactics that can help you provide your site visitor with everything they need to persuade them to make a purchase without overselling.<\/p>\n

Elements of successful holiday marketing campaigns<\/h2>\n

Planning a holiday marketing campaign is something that you should not do weeks before the holiday shopping season. Successful retailers begin to plan their marketing campaigns months before the upcoming holiday season.<\/p>\n

The reason?<\/p>\n

It takes time to put together all the key elements of a successful holiday marketing campaign \u2013 this is something that we have noticed over the years of working with big and small online stores.<\/p>\n

With that said, now let’s take at the three elements that make a successful holiday campaign:<\/p>\n

1. Define your target audience<\/strong><\/p>\n

Your target audience refers to a specific group of people who are more likely to purchase your product, therefore, the group of potential consumers you should optimize your website for.<\/p>\n

Many factors such as gender, age, location, income, interests can dictate your target audience.<\/p>\n

Defining your target audience also includes articulating who your target audience isn’t. Many at time people tend to confuse their target audience with their target market. The former refers to a set of consumers that you plan to sell to or reach via your marketing efforts.<\/p>\n

So how do you go about defining your target audience for the upcoming holidays?<\/p>\n

Looking at who already buys from you is one of the best ways that can help you identify your target audience. Where do they live, how old are they, what are their interests, how do they look for your product, how long does it take them to make a purchase decision? The best way to learn about all this is by conducting JTBD customer interviews<\/a> or launching surveys.<\/p>\n

You can also learn a lot by analyzing your competitors. Who are they selling to, and which channels do they use to advertise their product?<\/p>\n

Another thing that you can do is to take a deep dive into your Google Analytics<\/a> data. You can actually learn about who is visiting your online store by looking at GA data. GA can also show you where your visitors are coming from, what type of content they are engaging with the most.<\/p>\n

2. Review the previous holiday marketing campaigns<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sometimes you have to look back in order to know how to move forward.<\/p>\n

Without taking an in-depth look at the performance of your previous holiday marketing campaigns, it’s difficult to see what’s working and what’s not.<\/p>\n

The digital world is not stagnant, it’s always changing \u2013 something that might have worked in the previous campaign might not work this time around.<\/p>\n

Reviewing your previous holiday marketing strategy is not difficult, you can access all the data you need from platforms like Google Analytics, FigPii<\/a>, and many more.<\/p>\n

3. Define your goals <\/strong><\/p>\n

Once you understand how you performed in the previous holiday campaigns and who your target audience is, then it’s time to set goals for the holiday season.<\/p>\n

As much as you may want to have more holiday sales, it’s important to make sure that the goals you set are realistic<\/strong>. The goals you set will help track your progress.<\/p>\n

Every goal should be aligned with your business goals<\/a>. This gives you a certain degree of direction in your whole marketing plan.<\/p>\n

Remember, for every goal you set, don’t forget to set KPIs that you will use to measure your progress. You can also create custom goals in GA to fit your company’s unique needs.<\/p>\n

Tracking how holiday marketing plans contributed to your main goals or objectives empowers you with the right data that you can use to improve your marketing strategy going forward.<\/p>\n

11 Holiday marketing strategies and campaigns that work<\/h2>\n

Below are 11-holiday marketing strategies and tactics you can use to convince potential customers to buy from you and also become loyal customers:<\/p>\n

1. Don\u2019t underestimate the power of data<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Look, the reality is the qualitative data that you can extract from analytics on holiday shopper activity is tremendous. Nothing can help you determine areas of focus for optimization on your website like real-time data.<\/p>\n

So start tracking customer activity and purchases like a pro.<\/p>\n

Segment the life out of the data to gain as many insights as possible. This will help you hone in on how different traffic sources differ in their purchase activity, returning vs. new visitors, high AOV vs. low AOV customers, etc.<\/p>\n

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We generally set up anywhere between 15 to 20 different funnels for any of our customers, and what better time to see how customers are flowing on your website at a micro-level than during the holidays?<\/p>\n

Well, it\u2019s argued that because these customers are so highly motivated, the data may not be as reliable.<\/p>\n

However, we find holiday data helpful in a few areas:<\/p>\n