Countdown
You’re doing it anyway, why not engage your followers. Christmas time is a wonderful chance to create a series that embraces the festive spirit, encourages engagement and of course, drives sales. Consider running a 12 days of Christmas giveaway where you share a small prize each day, encouraging users to like, comment tagging a friend and follow your page. This is an excellent way to give back to your audience and encourage brand awareness. Your 12 days of Christmas may be 12 days spotlighting different employees or clients on your IG stories. Try a video where you interview different people that showcase your brand and story. Furthermore, you could offer a different deal or discount for each day leading up to Christmas, 10% off one day, a gift with purchase the next etc. This kind of content obviously requires some planning and forward thinking but tends to be well worth it!
The Annual [YOUR BUSINESS HERE] Christmas Card
Thinking about your company Christmas post? Why not make a day of it. Pick a day where you ask your staff to come dressed in their best Christmas themed outfits and get that team shot and share it! Photos showcasing your team are often the most highly engaging, particularly for small businesses where your customers are likely to come in contact with your staff regularly. This kind of post feels far more personal and festive than your stock standard Christmas tree photo on the grid.
Make a list Santa approves of
Gift guides are some of the most highly searched blog content over this period and often some of the easiest to put together. Theme your gift guides based on your brand and use it as an opportunity to shout out other products or services that complement your product or business or other small businesses! Be sure to include links, particularly back to your own products and share these blogs on your socials. Breaking your gift guide down into individual products you can share on stories is a great way to make the most of your content across platforms.
Collaborate
Know other small businesses with products that complement yours? Perhaps you’ve thought of a few when considering your gift guide? Get in touch and suggest you collaborate for a Christmas gift giveaway. Businesses of similar followings work best here. Its a matter of reaching out and deciding on the following factors early:
- What each business can contribute to the gift pack
- Who will create the social assets (images of the prize pack)
- How many posts and the type of posts each business will share (perhaps 1 static IG post in the feed + 3 stories each)
- The giveaway objective: Do you want to direct people to a common landing page where they sign up to everyones email address or would you like to get more followers on the accounts involved?
- The giveaway terms: How can people enter? Usually asking people to follow each account and like a post is the easiest option and most engaging. What date will the competition run to and from and how will the winner be drawn?
- Who will send the giveaway pack and how will the postage costs be handled?
- Regift your content
Regift your content
If you want to add some festive spirit to your social media feed but don’t have the time or budget, try repurposing your existing content. Get creative here. Design elements can be added to your imagery, perhaps a photoshopped Santa hat on your model or a festive sparkle over your GIF’s, to get in the spirit. You may use your brand colours to create Christmas text posts or stories using InDesign or apps like Canva. Your EDM can be coloured red for the season or your 12 days of Christmas could be a look at your best blog posts for the year, shared each day on stories. It doesn’t have to be tricky!
