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How Branding Increases Sales
The jolliest time of the year is finally here, which means businesses are gearing up for a huge wave of holiday shopping. But the businesses that are experts at holiday branding will likely receive the most attention. That’s because solid branding has a direct impact on sales. Your company’s branding and marketing efforts are what sets your business apart from the competition. It gives your business a personality for your target audience to relate to, which builds trust. This is important because consumers are more likely to purchase products and services from brands they trust. Good branding also enables your company to build and maintain customer loyalty. Consumers become familiar with companies that have branding that they resonate with, which encourages them to keep coming back. With excellent branding, you can even encourage your target audience to share your business with their friends and family. In this way, a solid branding strategy can help grow your business’s audience.
Holiday branding is incredibly similar to the sort of marketing your company engages in all year long, but with a few key differences. Marketing efforts tend to be more jovial during the winter holidays compared to the rest of the year. Even if your business has a reputation for being serious and professional, it’s a good idea to lighten the mood of your advertising a bit. Holiday branding also generally focuses on deals and discounts alongside your business’s typical marketing messages. Consumers expect businesses of all shapes and sizes to offer some sort of holiday discount. Because of these differences, holiday branding requires a bit of a different approach. Here are four tips you can follow to nail holiday branding and boost your sales this winter.
Tips
Be Consistent On All Marketing Channels
Consistency is key when it comes to branding, and holiday marketing campaigns are no different. Your holiday messaging should have a consistent tone on every marketing channel your company currently invests in. This includes social media posts, video advertisements, your website, and even your physical store if you have one. It’s important that every consumer has a similar idea of your company, regardless of where they engaged with your business. As previously mentioned, consistent branding builds trust with the public and consumers are more likely to make a purchase from a brand they trust.
Disney is a perfect example of consistent marketing resulting in public trust. Disney has a reputation for being a family-friendly company that provides children with magical experiences. And everything Disney creates for marketing purposes has that same sense of wonder and magic. Their advertisements, press releases, and social media posts all inspire wonder in Disney’s audience. As a result, families everywhere trust Disney movies and theme parks to give their kids a magical break from reality. 
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Offer a Great Service Experience
This might sound like an obvious tip, but the benefits of offering great service can’t go understated. This is especially true during the winter holidays when companies receive a massive influx of business. The holiday season is easily the busiest time of the year for most businesses, which has its good and bad sides. On the bright side, companies can expect holiday shopping sprees to bring in loads of customers. But on the other hand, this surge of business can be difficult for many companies to keep up with.
One of the largest inhibitors companies face during the holiday season is an inefficient warehouse. A slow order fulfillment process is one of the most common bottlenecks that prevent companies from growing. Fortunately, artificial intelligence offers companies a solution to this challenge. AI-powered shipping APIs can streamline your warehouse’s workflow and increase the number of orders your company can handle. Some processes like label creation can even be entirely automated.
Create Seasonal Landing Pages
Many companies have landing pages dedicated to the winter holidays, and for good reason. Landing pages that focus on the winter holidays are incredibly easy for consumers to find. Simply adding, “holiday sale” to the end of a brand name in a Google search will usually show potential customers exactly what they’re looking for. This means that the public will have a much easier time finding your holiday deals or advertisements. Providing the public with a quick and simple shopping experience is vital to making holiday sales.
Seasonal landing pages are also a good way to optimize your website for search engines. Google is very adept at identifying seasonal content, or content that is popular during one point of the year but irrelevant for the rest of the year. When Google recognizes seasonal content, it will actually prioritize that landing page when it should be most popular. For example, USPS created a webpage with the sole purpose of explaining to the public how to mail letters to Santa. This webpage is irrelevant most of the year but receives impressive amounts of traffic during the winter holidays.
Choose the Right Marketing Channels For the Holidays
There are two marketing channels that are especially effective during the holidays: email marketing and influencer marketing. Email marketing is effective because consumers will be awaiting emails informing them of holiday sales. Marketing emails that include discount codes or coupons are particularly effective at spurring engagement. Influencer marketing has proven to be effective because people trust their opinions on products. This is important during the winter holidays when many people are shopping for gifts. People may be searching for a gift they don’t know much about and turn to influencers for a trustworthy endorsement.
Conclusion
To recap, many companies take a slightly different approach to holiday branding. That’s because consumers expect a more jolly tone and the promise of a holiday sale. To boost your sales this holiday season your company should be consistent across every marketing channel you invest in, but remember that email marketing and influencer marketing are particularly effective this time of year. You should also consider creating seasonal landing pages that generate organic traffic annually during the winter holidays. And finally, always provide excellent service to your customers. Try your best to anticipate increased sales and ensure you have enough inventory to make it through the season.
READ MORE: Marketing Strategies for 2022 and Beyond
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