We are already into one of the busiest periods of the year, whether you are product of service-based business, but the light at the end of the tunnel is the festive break upon us- so we want to do all we can to prepare your marketing.
If you are anything like me this ‘break’ is also coupled with the children finishing school and nursery until the new year- ekk. So how can you prepare your business and marketing for this period so you can enjoy a well-deserved break but still generate results?
I wanted to share a few tips with your that you might not have considered to be the best prepared in your marketing over the Christmas period.
Don’t over stretch yourself
As our Christmas activity starts to ramp up you may need to consider a few quick and easy ideas to continue to market yourself without over stretching and over committing yourself. If you have the time (and energy) to invest in some creative marketing campaigns this is always worthwhile but commit to delivering what you can.
The wonderful Claire Grace from The Assistant Quarters shared an amazing template with me called Do, Ditch, Delay and Delegate. Create a list of all the elements of your marketing plan and focus on what you can DO before you finish and DITCH the elements that aren’t important.
DELAY is all about re-prioritising tasks until you have time and DELEGATE is about getting the right support to help you get the task done by outsourcing to an expert.
Managing customers’ expectations
One thing that can often get overlooked during your busy periods is communication and managing your customers’ expectations. Be sure to let your customers and audience know your availability over the festive period.
You should do this across all your marketing platforms like posting to social media, sending an email to your email list, adding your opening times to your website, updating your Google Business page or simply calling your customers to let them know. It’s important to do this more than once too as many might miss your update the first time you share it.
Don’t forget to set up your voice mail and your email out of office too.
Top Tip: On Instagram you can pin up to 3 posts on your profile. Why not set up one of these as your availability so it’s the first thing customers see.
Another important area to communicate with your customers during this period is your last shipping dates for Christmas deliveries too. Nobody wants a missing present under the tree so keep letting your audience know when their last time for guaranteed delivery will be.
Don’t forget that customers spending doesn’t stop
Although you may be taking a very well-deserved break, don’t forget that your potential customer may have more time on their hands to peruse your website, scan your social media and purchase your products or services.
I highly recommend continuing to market your business during this period, dependant on your product or service of course, many of your potential customers are looking for deals and offers to spend their Christmas money on.
Following on from communicating your shipping dates, you should also let your audience know when you will be stopping and restarting deliveries too so they aren’t disappointed.
Schedule your emails and social media
None of us want to be tied to our phones and laptops over Christmas. Unless you get a brand new one from Santa you want to play with of course but remaining active on your key marketing channels can be a great way to be in your ideal customer’s mind.
Social media scheduling tools and email marketing platforms can be a great way to share your message on a date, time, and social media platform of your choosing without having to be attached to your device.
Some of my favourite social media scheduling tools include Buffer, Meta Creator Studio and Metricool. You can even now schedule directly in the Instagram App.
For email I highly recommend Mailerlite for newbie email marketers (Free up to 1000 subscribers) and Klaviyo for e-commerce businesses, with its sophisticated email automations and connections with e-commerce platforms like Shopify.
My Marketing Marvels Toolkit has some great training sessions on these platforms if you wanted some training to help you get started.
Just remember you don’t have to remain as active as you normally may be- but as I said before- just manage your customers’ expectations and schedule only what you think is necessary for you and your audience.
Prepare for the New Year
Don’t forget to also start preparing for your return in the New Year. I would recommend spending some time on planning your marketing efforts and marketing plan for 2023, without a plan you will otherwise drift aimlessly.
Knowing where to start with creating a plan can be tricky- Download my FREE Marketing Plan template here to get you started or it’s a great time to book in a 1:1 session with me where we can map out the marketing year ahead.
I hope these tips have been useful and given you something to consider but as always if you have any questions don’t hesitate to book your FREE discovery call to see how I can support you further.
