Everyone knows that the holidays can be overwhelming, especially those who work in marketing! As holiday fever creeps into the minds of buyers, it’s always a good idea to review what has worked for you in the past and what your strategy is for the upcoming season.
Use these tricks to help spice up your seasonal strategy:
Making the Most of Ad Extensions
It’s easy to set an ad extension and move on with the rest of your campaign. However, features like site links, call extensions, and review extensions can help your ads stand out and better convert holiday shoppers. So how do you get the most out of your ad extensions? Before any campaign launch, simply review all running extensions to check if you would be better suited for one of the many different formats available.
Launch Shopping Campaigns
For anyone who is marketing physical products, shopping ads (formerly known as Product Listing Ads) should be a core aspect of your holiday marketing strategy. Shopping ads can help prospective buyers make a quick decision on which products to purchase without having to get lost on your website. The fact that these ads make the price and product photos, two of the most important ad elements, clearly visible directly in the SERP is why shopping ads are a powerful component of your ad strategy. Another benefit of this type of advertising is showing your products alongside competitors’ advertisements. This helps to show competitive pricing and product quality.
Ad Automation
What is your current digital marketing style, set it and forget it or hands-on? A set-it-and-forget-it approach rarely proves successful in the long run. It is recommended that you spend time every week optimizing and refining your paid search strategy. When managed properly, ad automation can be incredibly powerful for time-sensitive campaigns such as holiday promotions. Adwords offers a wide range of tools to help set the right parameters for all of your holiday campaigns. For example, you could create a specific campaign targeting Black Friday shoppers that will automatically start on the first week of November and then automatically pause or terminate one week after the Thanksgiving holiday.
Create a Sense of Urgency
Shoppers this time of year are already rushing from one store to the next and are already thinking about online order deadlines to be delivered by Christmas. Use this to your advantage and incorporate strong calls to action in terms of “buy now and have in time for the holidays!” All of your messaging should emphasize the hassle of Christmas shopping and how much easier your company makes it. One way of achieving a sense of urgency is by updating your landing page. For some retailers, this looks like a countdown timer to Christmas or the last day for shipping by Christmas, for others, it’s a flash sale or other time-sensitive offer. Either way, a strong sense of urgency on a landing page is a highly effective way to push hesitant prospects into buyers.
Do Your Homework
How often are you playing with keyword optimization? I hope regularly! While yes, you will always use core wording, you should also be looking at search trends around every major holiday season. It can’t be stressed enough that capitalizing on seasonal searches and other timely trends can help drive new traffic to your site and push your company into the black before the end of the year.
Paid Social Media
If you’re only going to advertise on social media only once a year, the Thanksgiving to Christmas holiday season is the ideal time. People are online a lot more this time of year looking for gift guides and inspiration, making platforms such as Facebook a powerful tool. Facebook has several advantages including the breadth and depth of the targeting options available, cost-effectiveness, and visibility. Consider where your target audience is spending most of their time and advertise there.
Although you’re late to the party if you haven’t already started your holiday campaigns, you’re not completely out of luck if you get started today!
