Create a flexible marketing calendar to sell all year long
The seasons in online sales are fading and you need to be nimble and flexible as a business to capitalize on every possible sales moment.
If you are for example in the fashion industry, you will probably have a natural reflex to divide your webshop into seasons and have an average of 2-3 collections per year. In order to surprise your loyal and returning customers, it is important to keep them enthralled by working with monthly themes and drops, which are relevant to a specific sales moment. Avoid the mistake of loading up your all-new collection in January and leaving it untouched until June. Chances are, by the middle of March, everyone will be bored with it. Customers want to be inspired and are looking for specific items at specific times.
Tip: Plan your year ahead using the sales moments (Mother’s Day, summer vacations, Christmas, …) and decide which items fit perfectly into these themes.
Here, you can find our marketing calendar for Belgium, where all possible days on which you can engage are included. Get inspired, plot relevant days for your target audience on your calendar and start thinking of appropriate campaigns.
Focus on year-round events
People no longer buy gifts only on birthdays and at Christmas. In recent years, many other occasions have emerged or become more important. There’s Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Friendship Day, baby showers, bridal showers, graduations, anniversaries and the list goes on.
So, depending on the type of store you run and the products you sell, it’s a good idea to market customized items that are relevant to specific occasions that take place in the lives of your target audience.
For example, if you have a clothing store, you can promote matching clothing for couples for Valentine’s Day or men’s shirts for Father’s Day. This will convince your audience to make purchases throughout the year and strengthen brand loyalty.
Cross-market
One of the great advantages of an online store is the ability to sell across borders. Each market comes with different peak times, vacations and habits. Adapt your campaign, copy and visuals depending on the market you are going to attack. Keep an organized marketing calendar so you don’t miss any opportunities.
Organic versus paid marketing
Not every day on the marketing calendar is worth investing in with paid campaigns. However, this is necessary to achieve growth of your webshop. It is important to decide well in advance which campaigns you are going to use strategically. Think about the strategy, targets and visuals to get maximum results from tactical google advertising & social media advertising campaigns. Determine the budgets, visuals and copy for your social media advertisement and make sure you are always findable on google. It’s a shame to announce a big campaign and not get the most out of it, by only betting on organic channels.
For all other days that speak to your customer’s lifestyle, you can schedule organic posts on your social media channels or send out targeted emails.
Good luck in 2022!
This post is also available in: Dutch