10 Email & Social Media Marketing Tips for Your 2015 Holiday Season Campaigns

Employing the right tools to send out the right message to the ideal target audience is essential during the holiday season, when companies and business owners are pulling out all the stops to grab the attention of consumers and generate more profits. On the other hand, how can you engage prospects and customers during the holiday season when competition is so fierce?

Savvy entrepreneurs know that combining social media marketing with email marketing often leads to successful results. Check out the following tips to learn how to drive sales and profits this coming holiday season:

1. The Content/Email/Social Media Connection

You can extend the reach and longevity of your email marketing campaigns with social media. Combining these powerful marketing tools enables marketers to more effectively engage their audiences, and gives consumers the means to share your content and promotions with their networks. It’s important to keep in mind, however, that your email subscribers and social media followers aren’t going to share your content just for the heck of it. They will share content that entertains or interests them, makes them feel like you’re listening to them, solves their problems, and offers them something that will improve their lives. Since it’s the holidays, your target audience will probably be on the lookout for unique gift ideas, money saving discounts, and holiday planning tips.

2. Launch Email Campaigns

Though not as glitzy as professional commercials, social media contests, and interactive websites, email marketing is still a must for marketers all year round—but even more so during the holidays. Your email campaigns’ promotional copy needs to be concise. At the same time, it should effectively communicate the benefits of shopping or doing business with you. Email campaigns also need to include a call to action and urgency approach, including statements like “order by [insert date] and receive your package by December 25th”. If you provide services, your call to action could be, “Don’t miss out on this special promotion which ends on [insert date].”

3. Keep Content Relevant and Consistent

Consistently provide your prospects and clients with content that is relevant to them, across all devices. Millennials have made staying competitive a lot more challenging for a lot of businesses (especially for the older generation, who’ve had to adapt their sales strategies). The digital generation hasn’t had to adapt to today’s technologies—it’s what they know. While Millennials are more trusting of the Internet, they still expect to be “impressed” by online content (to top it off, they have notoriously short and fickle attention spans). An inappropriate tone or any kind of presumption is sure to drive them away.

4. Don’t Waste Engagement; Incorporate a Dynamic Call to Action

Once you begin a conversation, make it go the distance. Make a promotional offer, request feedback through email, or drive your target audience to your social platforms. In short, don’t waste the engagement. Make your call to action perfectly clear to your email readers, letting them know what to do next. Examples include: asking them to follow you, Retweeting a special promotion (making them eligible for a prize), or continuing on to a popular topic on your blog, etc.

5. Make Your Marketing Campaigns Shareable

As a business owner, your foremost goal should be to capture your clients’ and potential clients’ attention. Once you have their attention, inspire them to comment on your content and share it with their networks. By doing this, an entirely new audience will hear about your business, along with the implied recommendation of your prospect or client. Don’t forget to add social sharing widgets to your emails and landing pages so that your readers can share your content.

6. Tailor Your Messages for Specific Networks

While tools might make it easier to share your content across social media platforms, don’t go overboard to the point where the messages aren’t tailored to target audiences on specific social sites. Create a personalized message for each individual network of followers, whether it’s Facebook, LinkedIn, or Twitter.

7. Invite Prospects/Clients to Sign up for Your Emails

The holidays are a great time to grow your mailing list. A couple of good examples include (1) Add a “Join Our Mailing List” section on your Facebook pages, website, and landing pages; (2) post sign up links on your social media platforms (there are even apps available for Facebook that you can use).

8. Take Part in Social Conversations

Pay attention to prospects’/clients’/follower’s conversations and feedback when you post on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc. If a discussion catches fire, make a point of participating to keep the conversation going. Always engage in social conversations, and use your audience’s input to come up with new ideas for email content.

9. Mix in Light Holiday Content

It’s called social media for a reason. People on social media aren’t into constant sales pitches. Be sure to avoid constant hard selling, and besides simply offering deals and useful information, keep it light and festive by posting holiday themed photos with thoughtful messages, videos, etc. It’s important to show your audience that you care, and keep them entertained as well as informed.

10. Check Your Social Media and Email Stats

Pay attention to how many people are social sharing your holiday content outside of your email campaign environment. Examine what works and what doesn’t, and make changes if there’s still time and use these invaluable lessons next year. Social media gives email campaigns a major boost in reach and power, effectively connecting all of your messages in a highly effective, interactive marketing plan.

Combining email and social media marketing makes it possible for you to better engage your customers, inspire them to share your content, and most important of all, do some of the holiday marketing for you.

Here’s to a successful, social, and happy holiday season.

 

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