Top 25 Christmas Promotion Ideas from the Pros

1. Host a 12 Days Giveaway

John Birchall, Social Media Marketer, Proko

We had our first”12 Days of Proko” occasion last holiday season, and it helped take sales through January. The promotion allowed some of our free customers to test out samples of their premium drawing classes that we provide on our site (as well as getting other fun goodies). In addition, it increased daily traffic to our website because users wanted to see what we would offer each day of the promotion. We encouraged the 12 Days of Proko event together with our social media reports and our newsletters.

Traffic increased on average by about 20-30%. Some days we saw our visitor amount double for the day. Sales spiked drastically on the times where we provided sales and were low during the rest of the occasion (probably caused by people waiting and seeing if there would be more earnings on the following day). After the event, sales picked up from where our ordinary was remained stable going into January and beyond.

2. Try a Buy1-Give1 Promotion

Ren Jean Chong, Marketing Manager, B1G1 (BUY1GIVE1)

In B1G1, instead of BUY1GET1, we advocate BUY1GIVE1. Each time you make a purchase, you return to a cause that complies with your team and your clients. This’gift of giving’ notion ties in perfectly with Christmas — that the period of giving. Additionally, B1G1 provides Gratitude Certificates to our engaging business associates, which they may present to their customers to thank them for contributing towards a really special cause. Clients absolutely love how easy it is to be a part of a giving community just by frequenting your company.

3. Ride Around Town In a Christmas Automobile Tree

David Klar, CEO, Trendsformers LLC

1 example of a job we’re trying that is literally on the top is the Christmas Car Tree — the only automobile roof mounted decorated Christmas tree in the world! During holiday season, we rent zipcars and mount our shrub along with watertight bluetooth speakers and push around NYC blasting Xmas Jingles and handing out a flyer with a hefty discount code on the site. Countless individuals have been taking photos and posting to societal websites, and it has already resulted in calls and coverage from several media outlets (getting additional millions of info on our merchandise ).

We also started getting calls from small businesses with fleets of cars or delivery vans/trucks to place this along with their whole fleet as a means for them to stand out, spread cheer, and create their customers grin during the Holiday period all time bringing focus their brand. It has been a really exciting promotion tool for them and they’re coming back for more.

4. Use Scarcity as a Strategy

Chris White, Co-Founder & CEO, Shinesty

Do something which helps you stand out instead of blending into the sea of vacation discounts and free delivery. We utilize scarcity as our tactic during Black Friday and Cyber Monday. On Black Friday this season we’ll be releasing 4 new Christmas suits that are small batch (only 100 made). This shortage is fantastic for us because it drives people to our site on days we want, and is fantastic for our customers because those who shop on these days will have access to new products that nobody else has. They will not be wearing the exact same thing as anybody else to some of the holiday Christmas parties. This is a suggestion which can be applied to various kinds of merchandise.

5. Don’t Run Out of Popular Things

Marc Prosser, Co-Founder, Fit Small Business

Every holiday season, there are particular items that seem to vanish off the shelves in minutes. Keep a close watch on your running inventory totals using a point of sale (POS system which has an integrated inventory management system. With Lightspeed, you also may set up automatic reminders to reorder stock once it dips below a certain stage, and generate purchase orders on the spot. Start a free trial today, and see how Lightspeed will be able to help you stay on top of this holiday hustle.

6. Don’t Forget the”After-Christmas” Christmas

Robert Russo, CEO, PromotionCode

It’s easy to become enamored with earning sales in the run up to Christmas, but keep in mind that December 26 is a top-three sales day, and 66 percent of Americans expect to shop then. Until December 30, well-timed”Sad Your Children Didn’t Get You Our-Product-Here?” Offers could be well-received via email. There’s the additional plus of not having to fight through pre-Christmas Big Box Retailers’ blitz of emails as well. Savvy small business owners know that sales are earnings and that as long as they’re made, it isn’t important if they come before or after Christmas.

7. Solve a Holiday Pain Point

Deemer Cass, Business Development Advisor, Real Christmas tree delivery solutions

A small company’ focus should revolve around one, strong USP (unique selling proposition) with a proven demand. For instance, we market real Christmas trees. They’ve a fresh smell and look great, but there is 1 thing that actually annoys people. Needle-drop. We all know thatwe did our research. So we concentrate on that single USP. We now sell only Nordmann Fir trees, the”non-drop” type. We also offer a free watering rack that keeps the tree fresh for longer, minimized needle shedding. In case you have a small company this is where discounts and promotions should be concentrated — your product’s tender place.

8. Update Your Website to Cater to the Holiday Mood

Rekha Panda, Founder & Marketing Director, RAEKA Beauty

Regardless of what it is you’re selling, you need to go with the disposition of your customers. And as the seasons change, moods change. RAEKA Beauty is an ecommerce system, so to get ready for the holidays, we begin changing the colours of our website and social media picture themes. We begin to make everything more lively and vibrant, and depict friends who are happy together. This reflects the disposition and joyous feeling everybody starts to possess because it gets closer to the holiday season. As it is also a time for gift giving, we’ve started offering gift cards. Here is the time of year when folks most buy for others before they purchase for themselves.

9. Give a Gift Card Purchase

AJ Saleem, Academic Director, Suprex Tutors Houston

I’m the proprietor of a startup tutoring firm, Suprex Tutors Houston, and my organization is near a Starbucks. My unique promotion is a free Starbucks’ gift card with any tutoring package, and it is particularly great during times when Starbucks is active and has particular drinks like holiday beverages. I usually observe a 25% increase in new customers and new packages.

In Fit Small Business, we also advise that you help your clients give the perfect holiday gift to family and friends –sell gift cards from your business. VisitSquare to learn how easy it’s to begin selling gift cards.

10. Organize Your Holiday Hours Online

‘Tis the season for special sales and extended business hours! Do not lose out to the holiday rush by simply allowing your online listings state shorter business days than you are really operating. Use Yext to update your information across Google, Bing, Facebook, and much more. Keeping your data accurate will bring you more holiday shoppers, so scan your listings today and have a powerful, joyous Christmas.

11. Throw a Company Block Party

Evan Harris, Co-founder & CMO, SD Equity Partners

Creating a media event disguised as a block party along with your immediate company neighborhood is a wonderful way to improve earnings over the holidays. Everyone likes to observe, and receiving different companies involved with a”Block Party” is a fantastic way to drive visitors to brick and mortar stores, while also providing a creative outlet for websites and content production.

These kinds of events are amazing lead construction tools as everybody has big plans for the upcoming business year. It is a great opportunity to roll out new products and projects too. You can take this a step further and include a charitable aspect to the celebration and help spread the holiday cheer. Last time we had this kind of event, it led to a couple of dozen prospects, which transported us well into the new calendar year.

12. Run a Holiday-Focused Email Campaign

Jacky Chou, Vancouver SEO Expert

At the conclusion of the day, email marketing remains the maximum converting channel for an ecommerce site. An email drip campaign with the theme”12 Deals of Christmas” was a plan I used for the customers which turned out to be the highest converting campaign to date. To go into more compact details, you’d have different automated drip campaigns depending on what they have purchased previously. This can be accomplished through tools like Zapier or even Hubspot.

13. Offer a Gift with Purchase

Zondra Wilson, Founder & CEO, Blu Skin Care

Blu Skin Care, LLC offered free weight bands and 1-pound free weights with purchases of $100 or more. We also offered a 20% discount off all purchases to your holidays. It’s worked really well for our firm. In 2015, we experienced a 15% growth in earnings during this time, and also the promotion went from Black Friday through Christmas Eve.

14. Get Featured in Present Guides

Jennifer Boaro, Designer & COO, The Cat Ball

Many publications will post articles on the best holiday gift ideas, and among my favourite Christmas promotions is to get our merchandise comprised in these holiday gift guides. We make and create the Cat Ball® cat bed, a modern pet bed layout with a distinctive hexagonal shape and two openings. Christmas present guides work well for us since our product is truly photogenic, and we could offer entertaining images for bloggers and magazines. We got published in some top gift guides, such as a”weird gift guide” in the Huffington Post.

15. Pay Attention to Holiday Keywords

Brian Gill, Founder & CEO, Gillware Data Recovery

One of those things that we listen to throughout the vacation year is keyword research. Some business owners will target the same precise key words each and every holiday season. Because of this, they wonder why their sales are down. While every company will always have their primary, center keywords and phrases, it is critical to benefit from seasonal hunts.

Among the best ways to do this is by using Google Trends to figure out new key words that can really jump start vacation campaigns. If you’re able to associate core keywords with trending terms, you will likely have the ability to capture some fresh website traffic. Each holiday season, we notice a great deal of search queries coping with winter storms, blizzards, ice storms, power outages, and disaster recovery. With that seasonal knowledge, we’re able to mould advertising campaigns about it.

16. Pick Up On Relevant News or Current Events

Shaun Walker, Creative Director & Co-Founder, HEROfarm Marketing & Public Relations

In Christmas 2011, my advertising and PR agency brought tongue-in-cheek humor to customers of a little-known small business enterprise. We decided to exploit everybody’s favourite vacation and scare the bejeezus out of shoppers by alerting them that if the world did, in fact, end in December 2012, the year 2011 are the last Christmas on Earth. In its heart, the effort was designed to inspire clients to spend what could be their last days doing the things on their bucket list (i.e., climbing a mountain, beginning a band). There was a section dedicated to picking products based on your anticipated destination after the Rapture: either Heaven or Hell.

Constantly scan the information and see if there is a way you can hook yourself onto a developing narrative and how doing this will benefit the public. Should you choose a stand with the story or problem that’s garnered headlines, it is possible to become a first mover, then you become a shaker.

17. Try a”Summer in December” Promo

Marc Haddad, Owner & CEO, PGA Junior Golf Camps

We launched a vacation promotion last summer to drive summer camps for the PGA Junior Golf Camps. We did a reverse of this norm,’Christmas in July’ to a’Summer in December’ by bundling a present (in this instance a golf club) which parents could put under the Christmas tree and then a gift card to your summer camp. We put it as the present which’celebrates a child’s two most favorite times of the year — Christmas and Summer vacation.’

We used the typical promotional stations –electronic, PR, email–and beat sales expectations by 30%.

18. Host a”Bring a Buddy” Holiday Event with Prizes

Laura Cummins, Chief Creative Officer, Nine Dotz Consulting

I helped a client coordinate a’Bring a Friend’ holiday shopping event. During her spa, we put up channels that provided a sampling of this spa’s most well-known services. Clients who attracted a buddy were entered into a grand prize drawing. The grand prize was a gift basket filled with spa products and a gift card for their most popular spa package.

Everyone received a goodie bag full of awesome samples, and a unique promotion, such as a discount off their next visit. The spa gained new clients by embracing their distance, services, and goods. We had close to 30 people attend during the day, and 10 individuals booked future services depending on the sample services they received that day.

19. Make a Fun Holiday Video

Tim Calpin, CMO, ChannelApe

As a stock management platform, it’s hard describing what we do and also what our value proposition is to prospective customers. So we made a lively video — something shareable that may also act as a webmercial. We wrote a rockn’ roll theme song and cut our brand video to it. Check it out here

Now that the vacation is approaching, we will release a version of the that’s”themed” We’ll put a Santa hat on the emblem and record a song in the vein of”Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree” or”Santa Claus Is Coming To Town.”

20. Give Your Clients Money

Ivana Taylor, Publisher, DIY Marketers

My favorite holiday advertising involves direct email. You compose a letter to your”neighbor” From the correspondence, you tell them that you have decided that you want to give them the money to come to your business. Remind that this isn’t a coupon, it is money (a gift card). Should they come and spend less, you will give them change, but trust me that won’t happen as far as you think it will. Make the value of the gift certification something important, something worth driving or shooting action for. If you are a restaurant, consider $25; in case you are a gift store, consider $50.

Take the money you would have spent on advertising — state $5000 — and instead use it in order to conduct this holiday campaign. Don’t trade the quantity of individuals for the grade of the gift. In other words, you’re better off sending 100 letters with $50 inside than 1000 with $5 inside. It’s the value of this gift certificate that drives the visitors, not the quantity that you ship.

21. Match Your Promotions to Your Content & Social Strategy

Susan Payton, President, Egg Marketing & Communications

Often businesses have several things happening at precisely the same time throughout the holidays: they’ve got whatever promotions they’re doing, and they then have their societal networking campaigns and site calendar. Often these things are not aligned.

If you produce a calendar of promotions, you can tie them all together. For example, if you’re planning a mega Black Friday sale, then you can write a blog article on the best way best to remain stress-free on the huge shopping day, and you might post sneak tons of whatever you are marking down Instagram. By aligning your marketing efforts throughout the board, you will have better results for your holiday promotions.

22. Showcase Your Holiday Offerings on Facebook

Kris Johnson, Marketing Coordinator, The Gantry Restaurant & Bar

One of the most effective methods to promote a company through the holidays is through paid advertisements on social networking. As a restaurant, we have found it really useful for showcasing our vacation menu and any special events that we’re hosting.

Facebook in particular offers incredible targeting choices, which allows us to really zero in on our desired demographic. I favor Facebook ads over Google Adwords since they are way more visually attractive. Facebook Ads are only permitted to be 20% text, which means there’s a ton of room to grab your viewer’s’ focus while motivating them to click through or purchase. Our return on investment has been phenomenal using this approach. Our average price per click for many campaigns (prompted articles and ads) was roughly $0.25. Our engagement rates averaged 1.5% with impressions in the six figures.

23. Leverage Your Email List

Allison Tetreault, Content Marketing Strategist, Toast POS

The holidays are a excellent time to utilize the customer list which you’ve been building annually, whether through email campaigns, loyalty programs, or online ordering. Send out an email to a client base early, and encourage them to make reservations, buy gift cards for loved ones, or purchase your meals online.

Make certain you include a QR code with a link to a online ordering site or gift card portal. All iPhones with iOS 11 now have QR codes built into the camera, so they will be making a comeback! Also, include a”Refer a Friend” link in the email, inviting clients to forward the email to their friends, which means you’re not only reaching out to existing customers but making new ones.

24. Lure Clients With Mystery Envelopes

Jeremy Hood, President, Independent Restaurant Consultants

Our best Christmas marketing idea actually targets sales in January but begins in December. You are going to want to think of a list of prizes and possess a printer printing these prizes with corresponding envelopes and stickers to seal the envelopes.

Customers must open the envelope at the restaurant before staff (to keep them from peeking). Place an expiration date on it to create a feeling of urgency), and allow 1 envelope to be redeemed per customer. We’d give away about 1,500″mystery envelope gifts” and get about 20% return. Of those 1,500 envelopes, roughly 1,450 are small prizes like free beverages, appetizers, and desserts. There would be a grand prize and a handful of some larger items like merchandise or catering packages.

25. Contain Google’s Santa Tracker On Your Website

The Santa Tracker is a website theme which uses interactive channels and games to engage the customer. It will be published on December 1, and has generated quite a following. Since Google released an open source version of this Santa tracker last year, companies can include their own version of this Christmas themed program on their website. They have an Android variant for mobile.

From a marketing standpoint, integrating the Santa Tracker application increases the interactivity of your site during the holidays and allows you to connect and engage with new and old clients. In the long run, creates a greater pool of sales leads that will instantly remember your company because of their Santa tracker encounter.

Bonus: Create a”How to” Holiday Guide

One great Christmas marketing idea to publicize your company is offering a holiday guide to your customers that reflects your brand. It doesn’t need to centre on your product; more customers will value gift giving suggestions or holiday suggestions they can apply generally. You can come up with a theme that centers equally on holiday traditions and on your product or service.

For instance, if your business happens to be involved in property security, you a charm to parents by posting a witty eGuide on how to effectively hide presents from their kids. End the article with an immediate call to action for your product on the previous page for a reminder to be safe during the holiday period.