Your 2024 Holiday Marketing Guide

Oct 15

Are you ready for the holidays? Or rather, is your marketing ready? Don't wait until the last minute to get a strategy/campaign together. Let's get started today. I'm sharing 10 easy tips to help you get your planning and content started- and hopefully even have some fun along the way.

The holiday season is a great time to boost engagement, attract new customers, and close out the year strong. But with everyone vying for attention (upwards of 10k ads PER DAY), it’s crucial to have a well-planned strategy. I'm sharing a guide to offer tips, tricks, and tools to help you make the most out of this festive season.

Before this becomes as long as the intro to a recipe on Pinterest that you skip in order to get to the ingredients, let's get started. Ok, ready? Let's go!

🎯 1. Create a Holiday Marketing Calendar

Why: Organization is key and you'll be able to plug in content as the inspiration strikes or as you take photos that you plan to use.
What to Include: Key dates: Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Christmas, New Year’s, etc. Campaign timelines: When to schedule ads, newsletters, and social posts. Pre-scheduled content to maintain consistency. Don't forget those fun National and International Days of the month/week/year.
Tip: You can also add in any themes you want to make sure to promote before end of year like upcoming sales (hit your sales goals), what's coming for 2025, and other business-specific info.

✨ 2. Refresh Your Brand’s Visuals for the Holidays

Update your profile pictures, banners, or product packaging with holiday-themed elements.
Use holiday filters, festive fonts, and limited-time offers in your graphics.

Tool Suggestion: Canva has pre-made holiday templates for quick, professional-looking visuals. It's my fav, and it's easy!

If you need new content photos, create your own using your cell phone OR hire a professional photographer (like me🙃) for a quick refresh.

💌 3. Create Holiday-Themed Email Campaigns

Why: Email marketing can drive a huge ROI during the holidays.
What to Include: Gift guides featuring your products or services. Exclusive discounts or coupon codes for subscribers OR your loyalty initiatives. "12 Days of Christmas" or "Countdown to New Year" email series. Never thought of your services as a gift-giving item before? Get creative! Who wouldn't love a digital marketing package for their business or a co-working subscription?

Pro Tip: Add a sense of urgency by including timers or limited-time deals to encourage quicker purchases and to help you meet sales goals.

📲 4. Boost Engagement with Interactive Social Media Content

Create holiday-themed content like: Polls and quizzes (e.g., “What’s your go-to holiday tradition?”).
User-generated content campaigns (e.g., Ask followers to share how they use your products).
Contents or fun competitions (e.g. how many cameras can you find in this graphic? Comment the answer to win).
Online to IRL scavenger hunts (e.g., set it up on location, and have people visit your shop as one of the places to find the items, then post it for a chance to win) that get people in your shop AND online.

Pro Tip: Use Meta Stories and Reels to highlight holiday content and customer testimonials.

📈 5. Launch Targeted Holiday Ad Campaigns

Ad Ideas: Promote holiday specials on Facebook and Instagram Ads.
Use retargeting campaigns to reconnect with people who visited your website but didn’t purchase. Create lookalike audiences to find new customers who share traits with your existing audience using A/B testing.

Budget Tip: Test smaller ad spends at the beginning to see which ads perform best before scaling. SB, LLC does more than organic marketing- so contact me if you need help with this!

🎁 6. Offer Holiday Bundles and Limited-Time Offers

Bundle complementary products or services for a holiday discount.
Create exclusive holiday-themed products that are only available for a short time.
Promote free shipping for a limited period to boost conversion rates.

🛒 7. Optimize Your Website for Holiday Traffic

Make sure your website is ready: Speed up loading times (holiday shoppers don’t like waiting!).
Update product descriptions with holiday messaging. Ensure your checkout process is smooth and mobile-friendly. Always check the layout on desktop AND mobile to be sure that there are no problems.

Pro Tip: Add a holiday banner with countdowns or announcements to draw attention to promotions.

🎅 8. Use Influencer Marketing for Extra Reach

Collaborate with micro-influencers in your industry to promote your holiday offers.
Provide influencers with exclusive discount codes for their audience.

Pro Tip: Focus on influencers who align with your brand values for more authentic engagement. IMO we want a smaller following, like under 5000 followers. People who seem really connected to their community!

💬 9. Monitor and Respond to Customer Feedback Quickly

Customer service matters more than ever during the holidays.
Use tools like Meta Business Suite, HubSpot or Loomly (my favorite) to stay on top of inquiries and feedback. I recommend setting aside multiple times a day to check for comments.
Address customer issues promptly.

🔍 10. Analyze and Adjust Your Strategy in Real-Time

Track performance across all channels—social media, email, and ads.
Be flexible! If a certain campaign isn’t working, pivot quickly to avoid wasting resources.

Pro Tip: Use Google Analytics and built-in analytics tools from Meta/LinkedIn/Pinterest to monitor results and tweak your strategy. Once a week or bi-weekly should be great unless you are running a specific campaign, then give it around 5 days and see how it's going.

And finally...

🥂 Get Ready to Celebrate Success!

By planning your holiday marketing strategy ahead of time, you’ll be able to breathe easy and effectively reach your ideal customers/clients. Most importantly, your brand will be ready to stand out during the most competitive time of the year.

Best wishes and here if you need anything,

Sarahbeth Ramsey