This February, why not make the most of the season of love?
Digital marketing experts always tell brands and businesses to leverage holidays and occasions to engage and attract users and increase their ROI. With Christmas and New Year already behind us, there is one significant event you can take advantage of: Valentine’s Day.
Fancy restaurants, hotels, flower shops, and jewelry merchants aren’t the only businesses that can benefit from Valentine’s Day. You could be selling graphic tees or homeware items and still make your products and services relevant to the much-anticipated occasion. You just need to learn a few creative tactics to market them well during this buying season.
Ready to add a Valentine twist to your digital marketing strategies? Read on to learn a few tips and tricks.
1. Redefine your target audience
Create couple-related offers but generate original digital marketing ideas for singles, families (like gifts for parents and siblings), and friends. Valentine’s Day can also be a day for singles to treat themselves and invest in self-care. It’s a great day to celebrate friendships and family relationships too, as people also hunt for gifts for friends, family, and even pets. As for couples, it would be nice to be gender-sensitive and use the right words and imagery to relate to couples in same-sex relationships.
It’s a challenge to find new ways of marketing your offers to people, celebrating a wide range of relationships, but it can also be a great opportunity for boosting your brand image.
2. Gather your most give-worthy items
What are your most gift-worthy products? What are the items or services that are likely to be most meaningful to your audience on V-day? It’s time to gather and highlight them on your website (or online store) and social media profiles.
You may create graphics and Valentine’s Day-worthy captions. Market these products as great choices for anyone visiting your website or page during the weeks leading up to Valentine’s Day.
3. Bundle your items
Next to identifying your gift-worthy products, the next step is to present them like one. The key is to combine multiple items. While items like soap, candles, and spa essentials don’t seem like much of a gift, they can be made more attractive when packaged together into a pretty gift basket with ribbons and petals. You can also sell your items in pairs, for opportunities of giving something matchy-matchy.
4. Deals, discounts, and giveaways for two
You can never go wrong with the classic buy-one-take-one deal, but make it Valentine’s Day-themed.
“Valentine’s Day Specials” is the name of the game. Restaurants and cafes can curate a menu for couples, complete with desserts and drinks. Tattoo shops can have two minimalist tattoo packages, perfect for matching tattoos. Shirt shops can have “Get 20% off when you buy two shirts from February 7-14” promos. If you’re running a hotel, this hotel digital marketing agency also recommends having couple’s getaway packages, like free breakfast, wine, and spa service that come with the room rate.
People love to celebrate Valentine’s Day but they don’t want to burn their wallets. You can make them happy by offering your high-quality products and services while saving them time and money.
5. Redesign your online platforms
Let your customers feel that the season of love has truly arrived. Spruce up your website and social media profiles and incorporate Valentine’s day in your messaging and imagery. You know the drill — hearts, red, pink, and white hues, flowers. Fill your content calendar with everything Valentine’s Day-related too, from your photos to your captions and blogs.
6. Promote, promote, promote
It’s not enough that you have creative gimmicks. You should also take the time in promoting them across your digital platforms, like your website and social media accounts.
Post high-quality photos, like well-photograph shots and attractive graphics. Promote specials on your homepage. Send messages and push notifications to your email subscribers ahead of time.
Make your promotions time-sensitive to inform your customers faster. You may start during the last week of January leading up to the big day.
7. Create lots of Valentine’s Day-themed content
Content marketing can be used for seasonal digital marketing. Where to start? Try answering what your customers would likely ask or seek help with during Valentine’s Day.
You can write blogs or articles, post share-worthy photos, humorous comic strips, and memes, and provide informative content to offer helpful information to potential customers. You may put together a Valentine’s Day gift guide, or write articles that focus on date ideas or affordable ways to treat your partner. Don’t forget to link to your website and product page.
If you have the time and budget, you can also create videos like short films with product placement. Not all holiday content should directly promote your products but make sure they’re relevant to your brand and what you offer.
8. Engage on social media
Social media is all about engagement. Next to using your usual product posts as engagement materials, you can also leave room for other fun ways of interacting with your followers. You can do the following:
- Ask Valentine’s Day-related questions or host a poll
- Think of fun games and contests
- Have some giveaways in a form of free products or vouchers
- Ask them to share their love stories or mention your brand in their posts
- Generate Valentine’s Day hashtags
- Collaborate with influencers
Another powerful tactic is using user-generated content (UGC). The efforts stated above can give you opportunities to share your audience’s content and build your brand’s reputation.
No need to sell flowers or chocolates — with a perfect mix of creativity and thoughtful planning, you’ll be able to leverage Valentine’s Day to your brand’s success.
Author Bio: Carmina Natividad is a web content writer during the day and a foodie, musician, coffee connoisseur, and plant mom when her day shift is over. She enjoys sharing her insights about blogging, web design, SEO, and other forms of digital marketing. To know more about digital marketing, check out the blogs of SPRINT DIGITAL Agency Dublin.
