11 Creative Holiday Campaigns to Drive Quality Leads to Your Site

What better time than during the holidays to run special marketing campaigns?

During these cherished times, people want to host gatherings, purchase gifts, and participate in festive activities.

Your brand can capitalize on this season by creating special offers, hosting fun contests, sharing interactive content, or simply spreading cheer.

Let’s explore some of the best holiday campaign ideas to help you drive sales and conversions during the most wonderful time of the year.

A Checklist for Your Holiday Marketing Campaigns

Before you start jingling all the way to your customers’ inboxes, there are a few things to keep in mind first.

Here’s what you should already have under your (Santa) belt before your holiday campaign officially starts.

A. Holiday Content Calendar

You should already have a pretty good idea of what type of content you’re going to share and when.

This might include social media posts, emails, ad content, or blogs. A well-organized content calendar will help you plan your campaign timeline and ensure you deliver marketing messages in a consistent, timely manner.

As you create your calendar, make sure you plan to share content well in advance before the specific holiday. This gives customers time to see and take advantage of it before the holiday is over.

It also allows you time to follow up with customers if they don’t take advantage of your offers. 

B. Clear Goals and KPIs

What do you want to achieve with your holiday campaign? Is it increased traffic? Do you want more sales? Are you looking to drive brand awareness?

Based on your goals, set specific, measurable key performance indicators (KPIs) to track your progress.

For example, if you want to drive more sales, you might focus more on creating special offers and bundles. These are great incentives that encourage customers to purchase.

To measure how well your campaign is meeting that goal, you can track your conversion rate and the revenue you generate from a specific offer.

Tracking these types of metrics will help you further optimize your campaigns.

C. Customer Journey Map

A customer journey map is important when planning creative holiday campaigns to drive quality leads to your site. It helps you understand and anticipate each step a potential customer takes before making a purchase. 

By mapping out the customer’s experience, from initial awareness of your holiday campaign to their final conversion, you can identify key touchpoints where engagement is most effective. 

So, you can tailor your creative campaigns to address customer needs, preferences, and pain points at each stage of the journey. 

A well-designed customer journey map allows you to optimize your holiday marketing efforts by delivering personalized, targeted messages that resonate with your audience. This will ultimately increase the chances of attracting high-quality leads and boosting conversions during the holiday season. 

But how do you get to know your customers?

Let’s say you’re a hospitality brand. You can use BI solutions for hospitality to get actionable insights on holiday season trends and patterns to help optimize your campaigns. 

This can include information on whether your guests travel with friends, family, or partners and the types of activities they are interested in. 

D. Website and Mobile Optimization

Make sure your website is holiday-ready. If you’re a well-established brand, chances are website traffic is going to skyrocket.

Can your site handle all that traffic? 

Also, it’s likely that you’re going to get lots of mobile traffic, since 76% of people who have ever shopped online use their smartphones. So, make sure your website has fast load times and offers a seamless mobile experience.

An optimized site enhances the user experience (UX) and reduces cart abandonment.

E. Holiday-themed Visuals and Creatives

Do you have eye-catching holiday marketing visuals, banners, and ads ready? This helps capture your audience’s attention and gets everyone into the festive spirit.

So, make sure you create cohesive holiday branding for social, emails, and ads. Don’t go into your marketing campaign unprepared. 

Otherwise, you’ll be scrambling to create those visuals, which will distract you from crafting the right messages.

Or worse, you’ll end up with generic campaigns that don’t evoke that special holiday feeling people love.

F. Holiday-Specific Landing Pages

Consider using dedicated landing pages that highlight your holiday promotions and offers. 

Design pages focused on specific holiday events, like Black Friday or Cyber Monday, with a clear call-to-action (CTA).

G. Shipping and Fulfillment

Coordinate with your shipping and fulfillment team to make sure you can handle increased holiday orders.

Communicate clear shipping deadlines. Also, items can sell out fast during the holidays, especially if you’re running a big sale. So, ensure your website shows real-time stock availability. 

You might also consider offering last-minute shipping. Some customers wait until the holidays are fast approaching to do their shopping. 

Giving them the chance to purchase gifts right before Christmas offers convenience. So, you won’t have to worry about losing potential customers because their items won’t arrive in time.

11 Holiday Marketing Campaign Ideas

1. Interactive Advent Calendar

An interactive advent calendar is a great way to get your potential customers in the holiday spirit.

You can reveal a special offer, a tip, or a piece of holiday content that encourages interaction, such as discounts, free downloads, or giveaways each day.

Opus Energy, a renewable energy business for SMEs and large businesses, launched a Christmas campaign in 2017 called the “Christmas Conga Challenge” game. 

Players danced their way through a festive virtual office. They collected colleagues while moving through a lively conga line. And Opus offered daily prizes to keep them coming back for more.

The game’s success was huge. Players engaged for an average of 1 hour and 24 minutes and played 36 times each.

2. Holiday-themed Quiz or Poll

Holiday-themed quizzes or polls give you a chance to engage with your audience in an informal way. You get to humanize your brand and connect with customers on a more personal level.

This creates a fun, interactive customer experience.

So, what types of quizzes or polls do you put out during the holiday season?

Consider creating quizzes related to holiday shopping, gift suggestions, or fun holiday trivia. Polls can ask about favorite holiday traditions or plans.

Waggle, a pet shop and crowdfunding company that helps with vet bills, keeps its Instagram holiday poll simple and to the point.

It asks its audience if they get their pets a holiday gift. This is a fun way to get to know its audience and break the ice. It also gives Waggle the opportunity to promote its online store, where pet owners can check out and buy the perfect gift for their furry friends.

3. Exclusive Holiday Bundle or Package Deal

Exclusive holiday bundles or package deals can help you increase sales during the holiday season. During this time, people are always looking for bargains and deals to help them save on purchases.

You can bundle related products or services at a discounted price. To create a sense of urgency, it’s also important to highlight that the offer is only available for a limited time. Bundling products adds value and encourages customers to purchase more, especially for gift-giving.

As a result, you can raise average order value (AOV) and drive significant revenue growth for your holiday marketing campaign.

This X post shows SEGA Shop Europe’s Halloween Bundle. Customers save when they purchase three items altogether—Sonic the Hedgehog T-shirt, mug, and video game.

4. Gift Guide with a Twist

A holiday gift guide is a classic marketing tool. Why? Because many holiday shoppers are stumped about what gifts to buy for their loved ones.

For example, there’s always one person who has everything. In other cases, the recipient is picky, or they’ve explicitly stated that they don’t necessarily want or need more stuff.

This is where a gift guide comes in handy. You can offer shoppers a curated list of items they can buy.

But instead of a standard guide, you can organize your products based on specific personality types, interests, or even quirky holiday themes.

This does three things.

• It adds a personal touch to the shopping experience.
• It provides value to customers by helping them find the perfect gifts for their loved ones.
• It encourages shoppers to spend more time on your site.

This post on TikTok is the perfect example of a personalized gift guide. In this case, it’s for people who love to cook. 

In the video, you can see different cooking products in front of a green screen: pots and pans, a cutting board, a mortar and pestle, a cookbook stand, a mixing bowl, high-quality imported salt, and more.

5. Seasonal Charity Partnership Program

Consider partnering with a charity during the holiday season to align with a meaningful cause. This also encourages customers to give back.

You can donate a portion of each sale to a charity or offer customers the option to round up their purchases for a good cause.

This type of campaign creates a sense of community and goodwill, which makes customers feel good about shopping with you.

In the email below, affiliate marketing network CJ Affiliate announced that it would support charitable organizations.

Instead of sending traditional festive cards, CJ donated the budget for the cards to charity. 

More than two in five consumers are more likely to do business with brands that donate a portion of their profits to charity. So, CJ Affiliates is doing a great job attracting and retaining affiliates. 

Plus, it invites its affiliates to decide which charitable cause to distribute the donation to. Making people feel like they’re part of the decision is another great way to foster loyalty and a sense of community.

6. Countdown Timer for Limited Holiday Offers

A countdown timer on your website or in your email campaigns for limited-time holiday deals adds a sense of urgency.

Whether it’s a flash sale, a special holiday discount, or exclusive free shipping offers, a countdown timer visually communicates that time is running out. The feeling of urgency this incites in customers can increase sales by 332%

That’s because it taps into a person’s fear of missing out (FOMO), which causes customers to act quickly. 

Forever 21 often does this, especially for Black Friday shopping when brands offer major deals and discounts. 

On its website, customers often see countdown timers that show when a sale is going to end. This helps motivate them to make a purchase before time runs out.

7. Personalized Holiday Emails

Personalized holiday email campaigns that resonate with customer preferences, past purchases, and browsing behavior are more likely to drive conversions.

You can send holiday greetings, personalized gift suggestions, or special discounts to loyal customers.

Personalization makes customers feel valued and increases the chances of repeat business during the holiday season. 

The proof: 74% of marketers say that targeted messages and personalized emails improve customer engagement rates.

8. Interactive Holiday Giveaway

Running giveaways before the holidays can effectively generate high-quality leads by capturing audience interest during a festive season. 

You can offer exciting prizes like gift cards, trips, or product bundles to encourage customers to participate in the giveaway and share it with friends.

For example, Cruise America, a leading provider of used RVs and RV rentals in the U.S., creatively launched a holiday giveaway offering participants a chance to win an adventurous trip to the Great Smoky Mountains. 

The giveaway included gift cards, RV rental credits, and other exciting prizes. This kind of promotion engages users and encourages them to share their contact details and interact with the brand. Giveaways create excitement, build brand awareness, and attract potential customers.

9. User-Generated Content Contest

A user-generated content (UGC) contest is a powerful way to increase brand engagement during the holidays.

This is when emotions are high, and people want to connect with others. So, why not take advantage of it?

You can ask customers to share their experiences with your products or service, such as posting pictures or videos.

This encourages interaction with your brand and helps you build stronger relationships with your customers.

The University of Regina added a fun twist to holiday UGC by encouraging students to participate in a game of Bingo. It asked them to share the image on their Instagram Stories and use stickers to fill in the bingo boxes that apply to them.

Then, they had to tag two friends and comment on the post. After this, they would be entered into a contest to win U of R merch.

10. Holiday-themed Webinar or Workshop

Host a holiday-themed webinar or workshop to offer your audience valuable insights about your product or industry.

This can help you position your brand as a thought leader. At the same time, you’re also generating leads by requiring attendees to register.

For example, if you sell kitchen appliances, you could host a holiday cooking workshop. Or, if you’re a grocer like H-E-B, you can offer a free virtual cooking class.

In this particular cooking class on YouTube, the team at H-E-B shows viewers how to make holiday pies. 

This is the perfect cooking theme for the holidays. Many people who are hosting holiday gatherings often need help perfecting their pies so that they can impress their guests.

It’s also an ideal opportunity for H-E-B to lead customers to its website to shop online for groceries or brick-and-mortar locations to buy goods for their holiday baking in-store.

11. Abandoned Cart Emails

Abandoned cart emails are especially effective during the holidays when shoppers may get distracted.

Perhaps they’re busy preparing their home for hosting or browsing different stores to find the best deals. Or, maybe they realized the items wouldn’t come in time for Christmas.

No matter the situation, you can send timely reminders to complete their purchase. A holiday-themed message, a small discount incentive, or a special offer for expedited shipping can go a long way in convincing customers to return and make a purchase.

This email from Model Chic is a prime example of abandoned cart recovery.

Here’s everything it does right:

• Addresses the customer by name (Bella) to personalize it
• Includes festive imagery to call back to the holiday season
• Includes a special offer (15% off) when the customer completes the order
• Reminds the customer that the items will be removed from the cart after 24 hours to create a sense of urgency

‘Tis The Season to Start Sleigh-ing Your Holiday Campaigns

There are a variety of marketing channels you can use for your holiday campaigns. And there are probably a million ways to engage with your customers and make them want to buy from your brand.

We only covered a few. To recap, we talked about holiday-themed contests and UGC, personalized emails, giveaways, limited-time offers, gift guides, charities, and interactive content.

As you build your campaign, don’t be afraid to get creative. It’s the holidays. Who doesn’t love a little lighthearted engagement to bring joy and fun?

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