The winter holidays create perhaps the busiest season of the year, affecting all businesses across all industries. We’re talking about corporations and small businesses alike. Marketing agencies should be especially wary of how the Christmas season will affect their bottom line and how they operate.
For some, this can be a make or break season and the reality of it is while everyone else is planning their vacations, you and your team should finalize your marketing campaigns to take full advantage of what’s to come.
Are you ready? If the answer is not quite, then read on to learn how you can prepare your agency for the holiday season.
Look Back on the Previous Year
Those who’ve been through this battle at least once should look back on last year’s holiday season and try to learn from their mistakes and at the same time, try to improve upon the campaigns that worked for the agency the last time. This is called banking on experience.
Use this to your advantage. What were your strengths and what were your weaknesses? Through this, you’ll know which campaign you can or can’t implement again or which aspect of your agency you need to reinforce, may it be in terms of manpower or budget.
What was your biggest hit? What flopped? Which day or week of the holidays did you have the most success? Do you need to work on your social media campaigns? Or do you just need to reimplement the same strategies over again?
These are just a few of the important questions that you should brainstorm with your team before moving on to the next phase of your preparations. Also, consider the changes in personnel your agency has had in the past year. Maybe you already have someone to make up for your weaknesses from last year. Sometimes, it’s not software nor strategy that helps build a strong campaign but the right people.
Figure Out What You Want To Promote and Focus On It
It’s only natural for marketing agencies to widen their nets in hopes of success, especially during the holiday seasons. As they say, don’t put all of your eggs in one basket.
Sometimes, however, this advice can be the downfall of an otherwise promising business. Moderation is key. Know the landscape but also know what you want to promote and build strategies around it. Focus is very important for agencies in this season for you may easily lose track of what’s important if you’re not careful.
Knowing what’s on your target market’s wish list by now is crucial to your campaign. What are potential big sellers? In reality, your preparation should have already started way before the holidays. As experts say, always be four months ahead.
Invest in blog posts, social media ads, email campaigns, and landing pages to promote the products or services you offer.
Check on That Email List
Your email list as an agency is the backbone of your entire operation. It can significantly contribute to the success of your campaign in motion. But, it won’t if it’s not updated nor given any attention.
Keep in mind that people’s emails are going to be bombarded with spam emails, promotions, and offers within this time of the year and you need to find a way to stand out. Eliminating unresponsive recipients from your email list helps in not getting reported as spam too often.
You’d be surprised as to what a catchy subject can do. Hint? A lot. Targeted messaging is also super effective.
Create a Theme
Themes are so important during the holiday seasons. It just gives you a sense of identity, uniqueness, and keeps things merry. When your products and services are holiday-friendly, people will be more attracted and convinced to purchase them.
Themed campaigns will always work. Take advantage of the holidays leading up to Christmas and the new year. Halloween, Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Green Monday, and so on. In short, plan with the entire holiday season in mind.
Know the Trends
You’ve looked back on what worked before, now it’s time to make sure that you are not losing touch with current and future trends.
We would like to use this section to emphasize the importance of marketing campaigns that are mobile device friendly. Experts even suggest that you focus on targeting mobile users for they access products and services using smart devices more and more as time goes by.
Do this but don’t forget about desktop users.
Final Words
Last but not least of our tips for agencies, make sure to not forget about your employees. They are going to be with you through thick and thin. They will fight your battles so they need to feel valued and heard.
Holidays are emotional seasons. Make sure to still implement work and life balance. Give them some time off, and we’re pretty sure that they’ll come back with renewed vigor.
Are you ready now? We think you are. Good luck and happy holidays!