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The holiday season is upon us and, despite COVID-19, the holiday spirit is still in full swing. The holiday season represents an integral moment for businesses and marketers to engage with consumers. Advertising during the holidays enjoys a higher engagement metric, indicator of sales, and internet traffic. In the last year, ad impressions increased by 50%, click rates increased by 100%, order value increased by 30% and conversion rates increased by 60%. All of these metrics contribute to the happiest season of all and advertisers are chomping at the bit to take advantage of this time. In this article, we will explore some of the best ways to navigate holiday marketing with influencers on social media by analyzing some of the more successful campaigns and strategies.
Influencer Marketing Across Social Media
It is no surprise that social media and marketing go hand in hand in our technologically connected age. Social media platforms such as Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube are some of the most powerful tools that influencers use to leverage consumer engagement during the holidays. With so many traditional ads around the internet during the holidays, consumers are constantly looking for a more personalized approach to marketing.
An example of a social media campaign is Amazon’s most recent campaign with YouTube stars to push prime memberships. No one wants holiday gifts to be late and Amazon prime offers an affordable way to get your products in time with minimal cost. Ingrid Nilsen and Alex Waasabi created unboxing videos for Christmas home décor courtesy of Amazon Prime which promotes organic engagement and reduces the friction between consumer and product.
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On Instagram, Armani Beauty has paired up with Wendy Nguyen and Julia Engel to promote fragrance gifts and fashion gifts with the newest holiday product lines to differentiate themselves from standard marketing tactics. Eos and MAC cosmetics have also been working with Charli D’Amelio on TikTok to promote cosmetic gifts and their newest makeup pallets for the holiday season. While these are just a few examples of successful campaigns, it is apparent that social media marketing is king during the holiday season.
@charlidamelio duet this video with your eos to show off your #eos #awesomekiss @eos #ad
♬ What Christmas Means to Me (feat. Stevie Wonder) – John Legend
When Should You Start and Current Trends
Sales like Black Friday and Cyber Monday are some of the most important commerce days of the year and brands will want to be sure to have a clear marketing strategy well before those days arrive. Typically, the most successful marketing campaigns begin planning in September to make sure they have adequate time to engage users and make a flawless campaign. The extra time will give brands the best chance to adapt their strategies to fit empirical data from engaging users. With various social media platforms to cover and influencers to find, brands need this head start before they sell their products in November and December.
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E-commerce is the biggest consumer trend that we see today due to COVID-19. More and more consumers do not want to go to physical locations and would much rather buy their products online. As a result, we are seeing more products directly offered by influencers via direct links or embedded product posts.
@charlidamelio i joined the #monclerbubbleup challenge🤍 are you ready to bubble up? @moncler #moncler #ad
Consumers are also wanting to see a brand’s true story and have a personalized marketing experience. We see this trend in influencers using geo-targeting strategies and having a more realistic approach to using a certain product. Finally, we see the trend that holiday shopping is happening earlier and via mobile purchases. The fear of failing to deliver on e-commerce surges during the holiday season has forced brands to focus on getting the word out earlier and ensure that their consumers can be happy with the timing of their delivery.
To summarize, these trends point towards a focus on convenience, speed, and e-commerce. Gone are the days of sprinting into Macy’s on black Friday to fight the hoard of discount shoppers. Now more than ever, consumers want low friction and an enjoyable shopping experience online.
Trends for This Season
If 2020 has taught us anything, it is that this year is untraditional and unpredictable. As marketers begin to ramp up for the season, there is a common theme among strategies. Namely, marketers, influencers, and social media strategies tend to analyze what they did last year and improve upon it by using the same template. This year, we are seeing more organic methods of holiday marketing that tend to shy away from traditional methods.
Most people’s lives have changed in a dramatic fashion. Commuting to work, driving kids to school, and even in-person shopping have now suddenly become a way of the past. While this is not a specific example of a method to boost your engagement, it is very important to keep in mind when developing a marketing strategy. Simply put, if the world is changing around you, your marketing strategy must change as well.
Obviously, as a result of the new change to lifestyles around the world, digital marketing has become the main method of communication between brands and consumers. 2020 will be a digital holiday and that means that marketing trends are going to have to stand out among a sea of marketing that is taking over the internet. Our suggestion is to leverage some of the digital platforms we have mentioned in this article and realize that the differentiation of influencer content is going to be a necessity.
Top Strategies
We wanted to end this article by giving you some of the best strategies for influencers to utilize in the holiday marketing season.
1. Tiered Marketing
One of the most powerful things that marketers have is information. Marketers have all of their information about upcoming products, new designs, and awesome creations and can use it to their advantage. Tiered marketing is the strategy of teasing about new content or items before they arrive and then only releasing a small portion of what you have available. This strategy increases demand, keeps consumers satisfied, and keeps consumers coming back for more.
2. Blog and Vlog
In an age that is dominated by tons of marketing, it is important to stand out and connect to your consumer base. For this strategy, think about how you can repurpose influencer marketing initiatives to create a blog or vlog for content. This both puts a face to a name and creates a connection between the influencer, and their product, and the consumer.
3. Engage with Online Media
Engaging with online media can give influencer campaigns the ability to reach a wider audience and give a greater sense of legitimacy to a brand. Pitching potential articles to media outlets that can include your influencer campaign could be a nice differentiating factor that makes your product stand out this season.
