The years just seem to go by faster and faster! Before we’ve had time to put away the holiday decor, it’s already time to start planning for the next holiday season. For most small businesses, October is a great time to start planning, prepping, and creating everything for the busiest time of year. Each year, sales get more and more competitive and start earlier and earlier. It’s being reported that many have already started their 2022 holiday shopping. This combined with the rising costs of, well, everything, it’s bound to be a very competitive market this year.
If you’re unsure where to start for your business, keep reading! This article discusses how to prepare your advertising, plan ahead for holiday sales, and ensure your website is as user-friendly as possible. We also discuss omnichannel customer planning and outreach to help you streamline your sales through several channels. So, without further ado, let’s prepare your business for the holiday shopping season.
Determine Your Advertising Budget
Before you even begin polishing things for the holiday season, you want to step back and review your analytics across all organic and paid marketing you’ve done this past year. What copy and creative performed the best? What platform had the greatest ROI? What keywords had the greatest reach? Advertising is extremely competitive in Q4 so your current ad budget might not make the same impact. By taking a look at what’s performed the best, you can really optimize your ad strategy for maximum results.
On top of this, you want to make sure your target market is on point. Create exact user demographics so you know exactly who to target and where to reach them. This may change in the holiday season because you might be wanting to reach those who are looking to buy gifts, not your typical ideal consumer.
Continuing on that note, prepare your advertising for the holiday season with an update to your copy and creative to focus on gift-giving and the spirit of celebration. Ensuring you have your marketing copy squared away ahead of time streamlines the process down the road and can give you good insight for future holiday season advertisements.
Plan Ahead for Holiday Sales
Some studies suggest that eCommerce sales may grow by 15% or more in 2022. Making sure you plan for your holiday sales can help you attract new customers and offer deals during the peak of the holidays. However, planning out what sales you want to provide ahead of time is a crucial part of pre-holiday planning. For example, will you offer a 12 Days of Christmas deal? Are Black Friday and Cyber Monday on your list of promotions? Making sure you have these deals nailed down in advance can help streamline your holiday planning and allow you to set up advertising well in advance of these great deals.
Another critical thing to consider is including several holidays in your deals season. Many cultures have holidays in the winter months, and while we all know Black Friday and Christmas shopping are huge targets, you can offer competitive deals for other holidays. Figuring out the proper holiday niche to target for your brand may take a bit more research, but the result is satisfied customers and added online sales.
Create a Content Marketing Strategy
Now that you have a good idea of the niche you’d like to target, it’s time to create a content marketing strategy. ‘Gift guides’ is a very highly searched term in Q4. Having blogs created for this term using your products is a great way to capture some traffic from search engines and bring a ton of new customers to your website.
Do some keyword research to find end-user search intent when it comes to gift giving. Targeting high-priority keywords around gift-giving may give your content a headstart this holiday season. First, however, be sure to check on more niche gift-giving targets. For example, if you sell candles, you may be tempted to target gift exchange shopping lists. While this is an excellent example of a niche for your product, there are other areas you may excel in, like family reunion gifts. By exploring all aspects of your development and its related niches, you can create a content marketing strategy that will elevate your brand awareness and draw in new customers.
Streamline Your Checkout Experience
If you offer eCommerce options, be sure to analyze your checkout experience. Updating your POS (point of sale) services before the holidays is crucial to avoiding glitches and breakdowns during peak sales. In addition, be sure to create checkout reminders for your website to help draw potential customers back to their full carts, and offer promotional codes and coupons to entice new customers. Remember, during the stress of the holiday season, customers are more likely to forgo brand loyalty and switch to a guaranteed fast shipping option, so make sure to offer competitive shipping options this holiday season.
Update Your Website
This section goes hand-in-hand with streamlining your checkout. Updating your website before the holidays has several benefits. First, you can avoid any unforeseen glitches right out of the gate by doing an update well before the holiday season. This added time allows you a chance to test your website. Finally, not only does updating your e-commerce site help streamline holiday shopping but updating your website can help bring clients to your business.
An excellent addition for the holiday season is adding gift categories to your eCommerce site and a spot for added deals and promotions during the holidays. Think of these sections as free advertising for your promotions, as anyone visiting your site will have the opportunity to check out these sections and do some pre-holiday shopping. Overall, while targeting SEO is a vital part of any website, ensuring your website is clean and updated for the holiday season can go a long way toward securing lifelong customers.
If you are a small business looking to update your website and polish your SEO before the holiday season, check out our small business deals to help get your business off the ground and onto the front page of Google.
For more tips on building your brand, take a look at our other articles for new ways to optimize your business for the holiday season. We go over key marketing strategies for small and mid-sized companies and offer plenty of advice to help you get your business started. Contact us today if you have any questions or want to discuss prepping your business for the holiday season!
Planted Marketing is a full-service digital marketing agency created for small to mid-size businesses, start-ups, and personal brands. We customize our plans to fit the business at each stage of growth. Want to learn more? Send us a message at info@plantedmarketing.com. Talk soon!
