October 31, 2016 rockorange

The Holidays Are Coming and It’s Time to Up the (Digital) Ante

Today is Halloween which, as well as meaning I’m dressed as a skeleton in the office, means that there are only 54 days left to Christmas. And only 25 till Black Friday which, for brands, is the real start of the Holiday season.

Two facts that holiday marketers need to have top of mind at this point in time are that firstly, according to the National Retail Federation (NRF), 40 percent of consumers will have already started their holiday shopping by Halloween, and secondly, according to eMarketer, total retail holiday season sales this year will only increase 1.8 percent. That means this year, brand marketers must up the ante when it comes to their holiday marketing initiatives if they want to maximize share of wallet.

So how, especially this late in the game, can they do that?

Simply put, right now, brand marketers need to put all their efforts into fishing where there are fish. And by that we mean focus on digital. Your digital channels must be at the center of all your holiday marketing initiatives from this point on. Why? Because, almost half of holiday shopping (46 percent) will be done online and 21.4 percent of smartphone owners will use their device to purchase holiday merchandise this year, the highest seen since NRF first asked in 2011.

And when thinking about digital don’t limit your thinking to your website. Over half (55 percent) of respondents in a recent survey said a brand’s social media presence has at least some influence on their decision-making process when deciding where to buy during the holiday season and that Facebook and Pinterest influenced 69 percent of respondents for shopping ideas and inspiration.

Similarly email should be integrated into your communication efforts with eight in 10 consumers who sign up for a brands’ email will make a purchase based on what they receive in their inbox. In fact, brands who sent out two mailings in a day last holiday season saw an 88 percent increase in email revenue.

The best thing about a digital first approach is that you don’t have to blow your budget to make a significant impact. For example, last year RockOrange implemented an ‘on-a-shoestring’ digital campaign that saw online retailer Zappos own back-to-school. The integrated campaign earned a robust 8,189 online mentions, representing a 2.6% share of voice out of the total 2015 Zappos brand mentions of 314,016. You can find out more in this blog post – How to Make the Most of Limited Back-to-School Marketing Budgets.

How are you planning on using digital marketing this holiday season? Let us know in a comment.

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