The key to planning and executing successful promotions is to make your customer feel valued, while ensuring your brand isn’t devalued.
When you sit down to plan your promotions, be strategic; every element of the process from inception to review should be carefully considered, and not be haphazardly executed because you’re in a state of panic trying to clear excess stock.
Here are my tips to help you and your business get the most out of Q4 promotions this year and beyond (because good retail strategy is a year-round endeavour).
- Research: what are other brands doing? Make a note of any interesting adverts you come across, and star emails that stand out so you can get inspired.
- Define your objectives: what do you want to achieve? Your aims must be clear so you create targeted and purposeful campaigns. Define your target customer and understand the messaging that works best for them so your campaign doesn’t come across as pushy or too “salesy”. Also, it pays to be realistic at this stage. Do you have the margin? Can you really afford to discount? Do you have the bandwidth? Be honest with yourself.
- Decide what defines success for you: is it a % increase in website visitors, or a sales uplift? Perhaps you want more likes, comments and shares on social media. Whatever it is, set your goal before you begin the campaign so you are focused.
- Choose your channels: are you targeting your email list, social media followers, or both? Perhaps these Q4 promotions are about reaching a new audience, in which case, you might want to consider paid ads.
- Budget: you should always have a budget for promotional campaigns that includes ad spend, margin hit, and the extra logistics costs for your business (extra packaging, fulfilment, stock)
- Define your promotion: will you offer a flat discount across your brand, or a tiered % off, where customers get a higher discount with an increased spend? Maybe you’re offering a loyalty discount, or buy-one-get-one-free. This is the time to get creative! A word of caution here- whatever you choose, make sure it fits the budget you have created, and targets your demographic. Also, keep your messaging simple- no one likes a complicated offer that’s hard to redeem.
- Put key dates in your promotional calendar: if you don’t have one already, create a promotional calendar so you can see all your key dates in one place. This should include the set up, go-live and end dates so you don’t miss anything. Set up will include writing emails, creating social media posts, creating ads and briefing your team and fulfilment centre on your plans. Timing is key with promotions, so make sure yours falls on a date that makes sense for your brand.
- Evaluate, tweak, repeat: once your promotion goes live, make sure your track as many variables and stats as possible; data is like gold dust. What worked? What didn’t work? Why? Then tweak what you can with your next promotional campaign.
Promotions can be an excellent strategic tool that builds long-term relationships with customers if executed in the right way, and Q4 is the perfect time to try a new approach.
What will you try this Golden Quarter?