Your Step-By-Step Holiday Digital Marketing & Promotion Guide

The holidays are a great time, but often hectic with business, promotions, extended hours, shortened hours, less staff, more customers – you name it! So, JSL Marketing & Web Design thought it would be helpful to provide a step-by-step guide to holiday digital marketing and promotions, at the very least.

We can’t help you with your staffing issues, or if you lengthen or shorten your holiday hours, but we can help your digital marketing efforts! With these easy four steps, you’ll be well on your way to a digital marketing promo campaign that will pay off.

Don’t wait – get started now!

Step 1: Choose Your Promotion

This is always the first step, right? You have to choose what your promotion will be – is it a signup bonus of some sort? A discount, sale, BOGO, or free download when they give their email?

A great way to choose the promotion is to look at your goals first. What do you want to gain from the promotion? If you want more potential clients and contacts for your email list, then exchange a freebie or download for their contact information. If you want more sales, then consider a discount or sale. If you want more brand recognition, have a giveaway based on your social media platform of choice (like a ‘comment and retweet for a chance to win’).

Promotions don’t have to be one-size fits all, so consider your industry, your goals, your services or products, and make one that represents all.

Step 2: Do Your Research

If you are running an ad, PPC campaign, or online promotion, you need to research your wording, keywords, target audience, colors – the whole nine yards! Because even a few words different, or a bland color scheme could mean the difference between a successful promotion and a failure.

You could work with a content creator for this, especially if your PPC ad is only a few lines, as it won’t cut into your bottom line much, but make sure you have clear goals. For example – if you want more emails for your CRM, don’t ask for 6 other fields to be filled out in order to get the promo or freebie. Focus on what your goal is, make a plan that is narrowed to that goal, and don’t get distracted.

Remember, you can always run multiple ads or promotions, but make sure they are each narrowed to their specific goal.

Additionally, make sure you are using keywords (and targeting an audience) which actually exists and gets searches. Having a great campaign that doesn’t reach anyone isn’t very helpful, now is it?

Step 3: Monitor (Check It Twice)

Analytics and SEO tools are your best friends when it comes to ads, promotions, and other online offers. Create trackable goals and then…track them!

Like mentioned in step 2, if you end up targeting an audience that isn’t present, or use keywords that aren’t getting you the volume you want, then you need to know – and if it slips past you in the research phase, you better catch it in your monitoring (or you’ll be wasting a lot of time and money on a doomed ad).

Check your monitoring software at least daily to see jumps, best times each day, interactions, outreach, and impressions. It’s important you have a goal for this area too – want an increase in traffic by 20%? Want 30% more impressions or reach?

Having goals makes monitoring much easier, as you have something to compare your actual numbers to.

Step 4: Edit, Tweak, & Enjoy!

If you see that your promotion or ad is doing well, then you’re all set – sit back and enjoy! But if you see any areas for improvement, then make edits, use an AB test, or poll to see what could be done better. Ask your audience what they want and deliver.

You don’t have to be perfect your very first attempt, as all things in life worth being good at have a learning curve. Try to only edit or tweak one area at once though, because if you change your colors, fonts, and wording, you won’t know which one truly made the difference.

Think of your online (or even in-store) promotions as science projects and try to test everything with purpose and a goal in mind.

Need Some Help This Season with Your Marketing & Ads?

Promotions can be difficult to get the hang of, especially during your business’ busy season around the holidays when you have a lot of other projects on your plate. If you don’t feel like working through your own learning curve for something as important as your bottom line, then call JSL Marketing & Web Design!

We have the experience and expertise in promotions, digital marketing, and PPC ads – meaning we can make your project a success in time for the holidays!

Contact us today!

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