Christmas Campaigns That Stood Out from the Crowd In Recent Years

December is a month of festivals and celebrations. We are approaching the end of the year and the central theme of the month is Christmas, a festival celebrated by more than 160 countries across the globe, it is an amazing opportunity for marketers to thrill their customers and end users with their range of products and services using innovative pulls and campaigns. It is a crucial time for both, B2B and B2C companies as this ”holiday” period presents an amazing opportunity.

For any segment, the Christmas holiday hype is hard to avoid and marketers are all geared up to fill TV and mobile screens with advertisements and special offers. From 32% in 2020 to 14.4% in 2021, US retail internet sales will decline dramatically throughout the holiday season. Despite this decline, total retail holiday season sales are expected to increase from 6.2% in 2020 to 9.0% in 2021, the highest rate in years, as consumers who previously shopped online are likely to visit physical stores instead.

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Getting Brands to Understand the Importance of Giving Back

Christmas is a season of giving and a good opportunity to help those who are less fortunate. Brands can use this time to ”give back” to society and create an example. For starters, brands can send emails to their subscribers informing them that theyr would donate $1 or some other amount to charity for each user who clicks on the email. Or compiling these efforts as part of a larger CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) program can work.

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What leading brands are doing to make Christamas campaigns extra special?

What’s even more intriguing is that a few companies have generated interest because of some very creative Christmas ad campaigns that they have run.

Continue reading if you’re preparing to run a special Christmas campaign. Regardless of the nature of your sector, we have handpicked some of the greatest ideas to assist you:

1. Holiday Spirit should be added to the page

It’s the ideal time to use your website and social media profiles to spread holiday cheer. Start by making audience-friendly adjustments to your brand’s logo and social media profile photographs. Use these pictures in printed and online publications all throughout the Christmas season. You must plan it properly and brainstorm some ideas which can look stylish.

Give your social media headers some holiday flair while still reflecting the current promotions you are running. Surprise your website visitors by greeting them with beautiful holiday images and seasonal greetings.

The Christmas season is the ideal time to make a few little changes to your logo, which doesn’t have to be entirely static. Why not place a reindeer on top of the name of your company or simply change the color of it briefly. During Christmas, red and green are the common color choice.

By changing the design on your website to one that matches a holiday theme, you may also instantly get your visitors into the Christmas spirit. This design (above) by Starbucks actually reveals that spirit. People can practically mesmerize their taste buds using their imagination when seeing this ad. Their method of effective marketing has always been a clear, straightforward, and captivating headline. So, you can come up with something like this. It is appealing and culturally meaningful too.

2. Share blog and social media posts with a Christmas theme

Make unique posts that meet your customers’ demands and showcase your work, whether you’re writing for a blog or social media. Consider the Cover Photo as your billboard and consider what information you want to advertise during the Christmas season. Perhaps you want to highlight some exceptional seasonal products or provide some special holiday offers with your audience. Tell your audience that with a straightforward and powerful design.

For instance, restaurants might post their most popular holiday recipe, fitness facilities can provide advice on remaining active during the holidays, and online shops can build a hyper-targeted blog to assist customers decide what to purchase their loved ones for Christmas this year.

Bring some seasonal appeal to your content regardless of the industry you are in. Top trending gift suggestions for the Christmas market were assembled by Etsy, a well-known e-commerce site that specializes in handcrafted goods and craft materials, in the form of a considerate blog. Those who are unsure of what to buy can be thrilled by this post and come up with something.

3. Never neglect to thank and reward your dedicated fans.

Why  not extend them some exclusive offers as a way of saying thanks this Christmas? Digital coupons can be distributed by online retailers on social media sites, or they might develop a landing page with special deals and market it only there. Offer print-at-home Christmas coupons that may be advertised on social media if you run a physical store.

Similar thinking has been put out by Safeway. They have, however, also tapped into the more private aspect of their business by giving a link to their favorite recipe along with the offers on their products.

One-day-only offers, sales with a limited supply, buy one, get one free promotions, and coupons for special occasions are some of the most common bargains employed. Make sure to set text on a background that won’t be too distracting in order to draw attention to the message. Apply the principle of font hierarchy and use a larger font size for the information that is more crucial, such as the discount amount.

4. Style Your Email Campaigns for Christmas

Create an email marketing campaign with a Christmas theme to promote your offerings or to convey details about the season-appropriate content. Email provides the most customized online environment, and it will generate more responses from the audience than social media. The RADICATI GROUP’s analysis on email statistics shows that email has 5 times more audience reach potential than any social media outlet.

So why not make the most of this platform throughout the holiday season? One of their customers, Kim Garst from BOOM SOCIAL, wrote a lovely letter to them. No one loves to be on a huge mailing list, so instead of only talking about deals, utilize emails to send a personalized Christmas message that appears to be a letter to a friend.

So, look at the way the message has been written and there is a personalized touch to the message which will touch the heart of the reader. This type of a message can bring huge success to Christmas digital marketing campaigns.

5. Think about a contest based on the theme of Christmas

A contest with a Christmas theme is a fantastic way to stand out in the holiday season’s cutthroat business environment. Most of the contests demand more of the viewers than just a predetermined purchase of your products.

A video of them performing Christmas carols with their pals might also be submitted, as could images of them wearing bright holiday attire. Make sure as many individuals as possible participate in your contest. Just to bring a smile to your customers’ faces, you might create a prize for the best and worst vocalist.

Posting about this proposal on social media is also a good option because it focuses more on getting publicity. With the hashtags #flyinghomeforchristmas and @airberlin, Air Berlin invited its followers to submit pictures of their Christmas celebrations on Instagram. In exchange for submitting their images, participants were given the chance to win a ticket home.

6. Ads need to convey a sense of urgency.

When presented with a sense of scarcity, such as expiration dates or real-time stock counters, customers are more likely to make purchases, according to the majority of prosperous eCommerce enterprises. Christmas is the perfect time to include such features in your advertisements.

Using social media to let your followers know how many units are still available or to promote a limited-time deal where you offer free shipping or a discount on a particular product could be one option.It’s not too early to begin making your holiday buying list. Also, deciding what to buy can be challenging with so many holidays in December. A gift guide featuring a variety of present suggestions will increase the interaction on your social media postings.

Target’s FOMO advertisement is spot-on. Target not only sells a Christmas tree, which is a necessity for the holiday, but also provides it at 50% off for a short time. The company also includes free shipping and returns, making this deal even better.Additionally, you can motivate your clients to participate. Always be certain that this chance is only being used to benefit people, not to promote your brand.

Having time-limited offers that spur clients to act quickly or fear losing a great deal can also encourage them to make a purchase. Snowflakes, bows, a Santa Clause sleigh, and other stickers from Content Creator’s pre-made Christmas templates can be used to highlight your design.

7. A charity drive must be initiated for brand awareness

Last but not least, organize a neighborhood charity drive over the Christmas break. We all understand that Christmas is a season of generosity. Your consumers receive certain unique deals and other incentives from your company. What about your neighbors, who are not your customers?

Participate in or organize social events that support charities or causes. Think about various ways you could assist them. You may, for instance, donate a certain proportion of your earnings or organize a clothing or food drive.

It’s not required for your company to establish a sizable charity section. It doesn’t take much to provide customers an additional reason to buy, even something as straightforward as donating 10% of your revenue to charitable causes.

Furthermore, you could inspire participation from your clients. Be sure that this chance is only being used to benefit people, never to promote your company. For its “believe” campaign, Macy’s has taken a similar notion. The marketing in this instance is focused on a website where users may send letters to Santa with holiday wishes. The business contributes $1 to the “Make-a-Wish” charity for each letter placed.

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Choose marketing campaigns that will not take a long time to execute:

 

1. Make the use of Smartphones in a strong manner

Do not hesitate to go strong on the mobile phone. This really is crucial during the Christmas season as many people use their cellphones, tablets, and other electronic devices for browsing and buying. They enjoy talking on the phone to pass the time while they are traveling, and when they have free time, they enjoy browsing the discounts available online.

This can be quite difficult for B2B marketing teams, but there are options for companies who would rather have prospects visit their website, such as Superlegal. Because desktops have a higher engagement rate and more conversions, they wanted potential customers to visit the desktop version of the website.

What should you do then? Improve your smartphone conversion rates and landing page optimization efforts in order to get ready for the Christmas season. For instance:

  • Think about a funnel that only works on mobile. Making it as simple to sign up on mobile can help if your onboarding process is complicated and converts considerably better on a desktop.
  • If your sign-up form has numerous fields, keep it straightforward on mobile and limit the request to email. Then use a confirmation email to get the remaining information you require.
  • Increase your website’s traffic now and do A/B tests to improve mobile conversion rates over the Christmas season.
  • Make completely sure your landing pages and user experience are completely smartphone friendly and optimized for Core Web Vitals. Core Web Vitals are hence page experience signals that assess a website’s user experience. Simply said, these signals gauge how quickly people can interact with your website and the quality of the results they will get. These indicators gauge how simple it is for consumers to utilize the website.

2. Give a holiday Coupon:

Retailers face a lot of pressure to offer discounts, according to the American Express Holiday Growth Pulse, a study of over 1,500 small- and middle-market business owners across a range of industries.

The study discovered that small and middle-market merchants put in a significant effort to ensure they get positive results. Many believe that in order to succeed, shops of all sizes will need to run sales and promotions. 64 percent of small-business retailers and 88 percent of middle-market retailers believe that in order to stand out, they will need to be more active with their sales and promotions.

These holiday campaigns have been thoughtfully developed. By providing considerate communications, you may improve relationships with your leads and consumers. This is the ideal time to go above and beyond by sending a Christmas voucher because it is the season of giving. Coupons are quite popular.

Give them to prospects to re-establish contact with them, to customers to increase retention and decrease churn, and even to churned users to re-establish their awareness of your name and your worth.

It can be a simple discount coupon or a coupon for a B2B-friendly retailer like Staples. You can get prospects and churn users talking to you again by simply adding the cost to your user acquisition budget!

3. Your email marketing should reveal your festive mood:

The majority of business-to-business decision-makers use the slower period surrounding the holidays to consider their alternatives and make plans for the coming year. Frequently, this entails deleting emails and setting up appointments for the coming months. Furthermore, it implies that you must locate the top team leaders during the holidays who read and reply to emails more frequently.

You should take advantage of this amazing opportunity. But let’s face it, nobody enjoys receiving unsolicited emails promising greater outcomes from a technology that is identical to every other tool available.

There will undoubtedly be more than five of these emails per day, but despite the fact that they are all identical, people continue to disregard them all. The buyer’s journey now includes essential human interaction, which was once considered a luxury. Customers of days like companies that treat them like people, not as leads.

You may, therefore, adhere to some advice on how to write effective cold emails, but given that it is the Christmas season, nobody wants to receive a business email. Alternatively, try one of these:

  • Send your clients an email recapping the things they’ve accomplished together over the last year and urging them to continue in touch in the upcoming year.
  • Write a unique, non-generic holiday email to your clients while still sending them a sincere “happy holidays” message! For even more direction, consider using some holiday email marketing advice.
  • Then, when the new year rolls around, you and your prospects will both be prepared to engage. This will ensure that your prospects stay engaged with your brand during the holidays.

4. Publish a gleeful holiday video with fun elements:

Even while video marketing is successful, this is not a recommendation to create yet another explainer film to show how fantastic your product or service is and how it will transform whoever purchases it into a more successful company.

A hilarious, jovial holiday-themed video that doesn’t specifically advertise your company is a better option. Instead, get inventive and resourceful.

So, you can do the following:

  • Funny movie of your team employees discussing this year’s gifts while meeting as elves. You can come up with some unique ideas and thrill those watching you.
  • A festive song parody that is relevant to your market, target audience, or company.
  • A festive song parody that is relevant to your market, target audience, or company.
  • A clever holiday video can go viral and generate a lot of social media buzz, boosting your brand’s visibility and organic traffic.

5. Publish holiday Themed Content

What other time of year could be more innovative for your content to be special for your audience? Profit from this period by writing some unique blog pieces that will stand out from the regular content can increase organic traffic for the entire coming year. You can try these

  • Choose a happy compilation of the top testimonials and reviews from customers.
  • Write an eight- to twelve-part series that will include 12 Days of Christmas or eight days of Hanukkah.
  • Give some interesting tips. Let’s say that your business deals in alcoholic drinks. You might write a number of blog posts and articles counseling people on how to partake in alcoholic beverages throughout the holiday season without getting intoxicated or losing control. How about recovering after a wild night with a hangover?
  • A helpful holiday survival guide for any problems your consumers have with your business over the holidays.
  • These tools for holiday marketing, together with our guidance to crafting cliche-free holiday text, can be useful.

*the images used in this article are examples of campaigns run by brands and are not ours

 

Picture of MTS Staff Writer

MTS Staff Writer

MarTech Series (MTS) is a business publication dedicated to helping marketers get more from marketing technology through in-depth journalism, expert author blogs and research reports.

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