When it comes to marketing your small business, it is important to find innovative and creative ways to get your products and services out there. And tailoring both your products and content to  calendared events could help you get a further reach.

In fact, using these moments to aid your social media, marketing, and advertising strategies can help you tap into the emotions of your consumer base and increase the interaction you have with your customers.

Here, we will explore how you can start implementing a seasonal strategy and how, using the holidays to help market your small business, can be an advantage.  

Researching

One way to start your seasonal marketing process is through research. Researching competition can help you come up with strategies that work. Seeing what businesses similar to yours are doing during the seasonal times of year can give you an indication of where you can start. By implementing similar strategies, and improving them, you can gain a competitive advantage on other businesses.

You can also research your previous tactics, what works and what doesn’t. This might even be looking at your current strategy and focusing on how this can be effectively adapted to the holidays.

For example, if your social media gets a lot of interaction but email marketing doesn’t seem to be as effective, then putting the time and effort into making seasonal social media content, rather than emails, could be more beneficial for your small business – especially if you only have a small budget to work with.

Season-specific deals

When it comes to the holidays, it is more important than ever to be handing out discount codes and set deals. In fact, 84% of customers are expecting a discount code or deal from businesses during their seasonal outreach. Failing to offer this - especially if your competitors are approaching the seasons with these discounts - could see you losing business to others.

These deals can entice customers to your business and potentially get them to buy a product they originally wouldn’t have considered.

Customise

If you are a bricks-and-mortar small business, then one of your best marketing strategies can be the layout and displays within your shop. When the seasons are coming around, it can be best to give your business a rejuvenating face-lift. Consider using a reliable card supplier who can produce seasonal stock and provide a point of sale for the store.

Customising your products can also be effective, offering your customers limited editions of their favourite products. This could be by changing the product itself, such as replacing the scent for a more seasonal smell, such as chocolate for Easter, or changing your packaging to have a holiday theme.

Seasonal advertisements

As a small business, you might not have the revenue or funds to keep advertisements live throughout the year. You can use the seasons as a time to trial and error your advertising outreach. If you are unsure whether it would work for you, or bring in the customers needed to keep the strategy going, then you can use the seasons as a time to test this.

As the number of people clicking on ads are likely to drop during the summer months, it might be best to approach the Christmas to easter holidays seasons for your advertising attempts. This means that during the summer months, you can focus your finance elsewhere, such as into community events or trade fairs – if your small business suits this sort of approach.

Get them exploring your website and socials

Another way to get your customers more invested in your products, and give them an overview of your business, is to make your content interactive. Things such as Easter egg hunts across your website and social media channels don’t only promote a good-feel holiday approach - they also encourage your customers to take a look around your products and services to find the eggs.

This is a great way for your customers to get to know your business better and explore new products all while anticipating winning a discount or deal from their Easter egg hunt.

Whether you are looking to increase the awareness of your business, or introduce your customers to some limited-edition products, adjusting your business to the seasons could help you build your consumer base and keep a competitive advantage.

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