Crush Your Digital Marketing Strategy This Holiday Season

Can you believe we’re already 1 week into October?

Considering we’ve spent the good part of the last 6 months in lockdown (at least us unlucky Melburnians have) this year has gone pretty quick.

With less than 3 months until the end of the year, the Christmas countdown has officially begun.

Are you prepared for the Holiday Season? I don’t mean to alarm you but most large scale companies start planning for the ecommerce Holiday in July and August.

It used to be just one massive push for Christmas. However, the game has totally changed and as the old saying goes, “By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.”

But why do so many marketing, ecommerce, retail and digital teams wait until the last minute to plan?

Because, let’s face it — It’s hard.

So how can you proactively prepare your digital marketing strategy and get the most returns during the holiday season? Let’s break it down.

1. Calendar Everything (and I mean EVERYTHING)

Q4 is filled with so many holidays and events. Make a schedule of important promotional dates your business is partaking in and backtrack the time you need to prep for those dates.
Here is a list of key promotional dates in Q4:

• Halloween – October 31st
• Movember – November 1st
• Melbourne Cup – November 3rd
• Singles Day – November 12th
• Click Frenzy – November 12th
• Thanksgiving – November 26th
• Black Friday – November 27th
• Small Business Saturday – November 28th
• Cyber Monday – November 30th
• Free Shipping Day – December 15th
• Christmas Eve – December 24th
• Christmas Day – December 25th
• Boxing Day – December 26th
• New Years Eve – December 31st

2. Build Your Audiences

It’s more important now than ever to focus on building a strong, loyal customer base in the lead up to the holiday season. If you aren’t already, set aside some of your budget for paid advertising to target new consumers to your website. Use your social media to nurture your relationships by posting quality, engaging content and spend time ENGAGING with your followers (I know it’s time consuming but trust me it will pay off).

3. Set a Budget For Product Listing Ads

Target consumers who are actively searching for your product. Google Shopping Ads are particularly effective because they showcase a high-quality image on the product listing, as well as the price of the product in question. These product listing ads tend to appear at the top of the search engine listings so your product ads are going to appear where searchers are going to be looking the most.

4. Set Up Retargeting Campaigns

Whether you choose to use Facebook catalogue re-targeting or Google’s display network, re-targeting campaigns are essential. The average abandon cart rate worldwide across all industries is approx. 88%. Whilst there are a number of reasons that account for consumers abandoning cart it’s your job to do everything in your power to remind them to come back. Whilst automated abandoned cart emails work wonders you first need to obtain their email by capturing it during the checkout process – if they make it that far. This is why it’s so important to pair this up a paid advertising campaign which will re-target the consumer using cookies.

5. Optimise Your Website

Can your website handle the increase in traffic and is it optimised for conversions? Consumers online shop because they want to avoid visiting a shopping centre. You know how frustrating it can be – crazy drivers, navigating through different shops and Karens holding up long checkout lines. Don’t let that be your users experience on your website.  Run a speed test, enhance site navigation, optimise your product listings, offer additional payment methods and a seamless checkout process.

Q4 can be the most profitable one of the year, and with some advanced planning, doesn’t have to be the most stressful.

But i you’re feeling a little overwhelmed and need someone to bounce ideas off and strategise we’re here to help.