2020 has been a rollercoaster year, so don't be hard on yourself if you were too busy negotiating furlough, trying to figure out PPE or simply just racing to keep going. It is not too late to plan for some Christmas messaging - and for many of us, the season's marketing has caught us slightly by surprise, so you're in good company.
This is a super quick blog because we're all short on time, right? And I'm hoping you find something here that is a worthwhile take-away that you can put into action right away.
Go for the feels - think community, family, friendship. These are tried and tested Christmas topics and for good reason. But 2020 has bought this home even more, see if you can switch up your messaging so that you stay away from sales and hard pushes, and introduce a more personal touch.
Get your hashtag on - use a one-time-only seasonal hashtag message to encourage engagement. Don't think about the sales - concentrate on the value of helping people come together. A campaign could encourage small random acts of kindness, letter writing or to send a note of appreciation, or to share a memory or an experience that others may find uplifting.
Offer something irresistible - and for this, you may want to partner with an influencer you work with or another business. You can be as generous as time and budget allows, but if you focus on the community around your business you can take it one step further and reward the best content – posted to your social media, using specific hashtags or using an app like Repost – or simply raffle something off as a prize for everyone who’s taking part in your campaign.
Whatever you decide to do, just make a start. I'm throwing out many of the rules in my book this year. Somehow, a lot of them are not appropriate for my business in the year that 2020 turned out to be, and I'm sure I'm not alone. Of course, in another year, and hopefully next year, we can all plan our Christmas campaigns before August and set them all up before October. But right now, let's not give ourselves the added pressure of trying to pull together a last-minute campaign or offer. Let's just use our social channels for listening and our email marketing for delivering added value - and watch where it goes. Let's focus more on talking to our customers - or having conversations with them when they speak to us - than pushing a sale.
If ever there was a season to focus on stories over sales I'm saying it is Christmas 2020. And in this rollercoaster year where everyone is fighting to be heard, I'm sure that our customers will thank us for listening to them. It might be too late for a campaign - but it is never too late to listen.
Image credit: Markus Skispe Unsplash
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