A strong holiday season is vital for so many local businesses.
But the omnipresence of marketing messages can make it hard for one local home services business to stand out.
Start preparing now to have your holiday campaigns heard, increase brand awareness, and have the best holiday season yet.
1. Leverage 2022 Holiday Marketing Trends
No two holiday seasons are exactly alike. Trends develop all year and culminate into a successful (or dreadful) season for businesses, based on their ability to use them to their advantage.
In 2022, local businesses need to build holiday campaign strategies around these trends:
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Businesses will try to recoup inflation-spurred losses to get into the black. We’ll see steep discounts on what consumers see as nonessential. Local service businesses will either need to join in the deep discounting or demonstrate why this purchase is essential — likely a mix of both.
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First-party data is more critical than ever as Software as a Service (SaaS) technology makes it easier and more cost-effective for smaller local businesses to understand customer behavior and deliver more relevant offers.
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The holiday season has expanded, starting earlier as many businesses try to make the most of the time they have to recoup inflation losses. Yes, Halloween is right around the corner!
2. Optimize Ordering, Scheduling and Checkout
Consumers want a seamless online checkout experience. Enough local businesses offer this that it’s now expected.
Whether their cart is loaded up with Thanksgiving decorations or they’re reserving space for a Hanukkah event, a clunky process — especially one that requires them to call you — will lead them elsewhere.
3. Appeal to the Desire for a Great Deal
Consumers will be looking at the value this year. Instead, of discounting everything steeply, share an enticing, limited-time offer via email, social media and your other channels.
Change it weekly, so customers stay tuned in for your deals and discounts. Make your offers memorable and shareable to expand your reach on social media.
4. Make Personalized Gift Suggestions
How can your local services become a thoughtful gift idea? Depending on your service, you could appeal to a more practical need for fun after a rough year.
Take these recommendations to the next level with first-party data. You learn from past purchases and interactions so that you can personalize offers.
First-party data technology works hand in hand with automation. Technology can ensure the right offers to go to the right people. And people love this!
5. Create Landing Pages Specific to Holidays
Are you running geo-targeted holiday campaigns on Facebook, Instagram and Google Ads? Don’t have those point to generic website pages. To increase your conversions, create pages dedicated to a specific offer and holiday. If this is a Christmas-specific or New Year’s offer, don’t be afraid to put it on the landing page.
Track landing page performance to learn what works best with your customers. For something as important as the holiday season, it’s worth your time to perform A/B testing to optimize the page’s ability to deliver more sales around the holidays.
Dream Local Digital has handled many holiday season campaigns for various SMBs since 2009. Let us help you get more out of your holiday campaigns. Reach out today.
