Christmas is fast approaching, and for small a business that signals the start of their busiest trading period of the year.
It also means that it is time to plan their seasonal marketing campaigns, and with a study by Crowdtap showing that nearly 65% of shoppers use social media to find a gift for a loved one, a festive social media strategy could be key to a bumper festive season.
The key to any effective marketing strategy is to be clear about the business objectives.
Oren Greenberg founder and managing director of digital marketing agency Kurve says: “Are you aiming to increase revenue by 20% or 30%? Or to receive 50% more website hit, or simply gain extra brand exposure? How you approach your festive strategy should be based on these aims, and everything you share, tweet or post from that point on must be underpinned by these aims.”
It is crucial for businesses to monitor their social media activity closely over this period, and tools such as o2socialinsights.o2.co.uk make this task much simpler and more effective in delivering useful data.
However, choosing the right channels is also important. For B2C businesses, Facebook is a good platform for running a festive marketing campaign - it drove 4% of all visits to retail websites during the 2012 Christmas season. Another top site is Twitter, which is often used for the reviewing of products in the lead up to Christmas. Many consumers use Twitter to help with purchasing products and reviews.
However, small firms that restrict their Christmas social media campaigns to the big three: Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, could be missing out on some valuable opportunities, says Katie King, managing director of social media consultancy Zoodikers Consulting. She points out that image-based platforms are growing in popularity and during the festive period, customers will be using these platforms to gain new ideas and inspiration.
“Creating boards on Pinterest or uploading product images on to Instagram are great ways to engage with modern, image-centric consumers. And during the festive period when decorations are a common sight and gifts are beautifully presented, you can encourage your network to share their most striking photos with your small business through social media channels,” she says.
Facebook and Twitter’s ad exchanges are another way for SMEs to engage new and prospective customers at Christmas by deploying retargeted ads on these social media channels.
Marius Smyth, EMEA managing director at AdRoll explains: “If a visitor comes to a website to learn about its products, but leaves before purchasing, the brand can display a Promoted Tweet or Promoted Account the next time they check Twitter. Similarly through Facebook, SMEs can target their audience on Facebook after they have visited a website to learn about its products.”
Timing is everything in social media, and there is a wealth of information available online about social media site trends and optimum interaction opportunities. According to Entrepeneur.com the best times for interacting on Twitter and Facebook are between 1pm and 4pm, whereas sites like Tumblr have an optimum engagement window of 7pm till 10pm, Instagram, from 5pm till 6pm, and Google+ between 9am and 11am.
The value of this type of information, says Kurve’s Greenberg, is that you know when is the best time to catch people, including potential customers, on these sites and grab their full attention.
While it is worth bearing these timing guidelines in mind, when creating a social media campaign, they should also use their own research and data to determine the optimum timings for your campaigns.
Alex Bussey, SEO specialist at digital design agency Pinpoint Designs advocates ramping up the frequency of organic posts, in particular, seasonal or topical comments, ideas or pictures, all of which tend to attract a healthy amount of social media sharing.
He says: “We also recommend that small firms look at running carefully targeted competitions as a way to get their name out there, and improve brand awareness. Competitions tend to attract large volumes of likes and shares, especially if you make sharing the competition status a necessary step in the entrance process. These also incur a relatively low outlay, yet will really help to characterise you as an engaged and proactive company.”
It is also worth remembering how big a role social media plays in customer service, which comes under increasing pressure during the busy Christmas period, when customers tend to have a higher than usual number of questions, requests and issues.
With 42% of consumers expecting a response within 60 minutes, the key to using social media as an extension of customer service is a prompt and meaningful response, advises Zoodikers Consulting’s Katie King.
She says: “This is where using a social media management platform is beneficial as it allows community managers to view interactions, engagement and conversation in one place. Not only will you need to keep an eye on engagement and interactions between followers and your page, you’ll also need to ensure that your employees are sufficiently trained and confident to respond and engage with any posts or questions submitted via social media.”
Content on this page is paid for and produced to a brief agreed with O2 Business, sponsor of the supporting business growth hub.
Sign up to become a member of the Guardian Small Business Network here for more advice, insight and best practice direct to your inbox.
