COVID-19 has taken a toll on the economy as a whole, and you might expect slower Holiday season sales. Especially for Halloween just right around the corner, every card is against this holiday, especially with social distancing being mandatory.
However, it is far from the truth. The NRF reveals their results on the Halloween preparation survey in the US, and it’s a beautiful day for ecommerce.
While there is a slight downward trend across all Halloween activities, you can also see the shift from going out to decorating houses. If your niche is aligned with this, you can score a giant fish this consumer season.
Not to mention, it is expected that the average spending per person will short up to reach $92.12, the highest in the past decade.
It’s more than safe to say that this season can gain you a great deal of revenue.
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But, it’s the last week of October already, and you haven’t prepared anything at all! No need to worry. In these last minutes, you can still pull off fantastic Halloween marketing tactics without much preparation and exploration.
Let’s learn about all of them.
#1 Always Be Friendly To Mobile Users
Table of Contents
Mobile is rapidly growing as the front-liner of ecommerce. Right now, 7 out of every 10 e-transactions start on mobile devices.
Hence, catering to this demographic is an absolute necessity.
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Keep the same energy with your Halloween campaign. You can do exactly this by making sure every element is mobile-responsive.
The best approach here is to start your mobile screen design first, then scale up for other screens that your site supports. A fluid grid is great and all, but it requires more effort, which is definitely not the time for it.
In conclusion, we’re aiming for a Halloween promotion package that has:
- Aesthetically pleasing design
- Full functionality regardless of screen’s size
- User-friendliness in navigating and interacting
Plan of action
- Start with a mobile version for every Halloween marketing product.
- Test out the interactive aspect of said products.
- CTA is always recommended and should be centered.
- Test out and improve the loading speed.
Notice how we mention “spirit” but not “theme”? Well, not all websites can sink into the lime green and bright orange aesthetic.
While running a marketing campaign, your brand image consistency is the most important. You can still use an autumn theme and color scheme to paint your website a new appearance.
Instead of this:
Try this:
And this tactic is highly recommended because you can save time and money on purchasing a new theme and also get back to your normal season soon after.
There are also legitimate customer behavior studies that show customers are willing to buy x2 of their needs if they feel happy and connected with your site’s look and feel.
Plan of action
- Create a banner welcoming the holiday. For example, something like this:
You can find templates for a banner just like this FREE at Freepik, Canva
- Complete the decoration across your social profile.
- Combine the banner with your (if any) campaign headline.
- Transform your CTA, side banner, up sales campaign with Halloween’s touch
- Install extensions like Magento 2 gift card module, reward points, upsell, cross-sell.
- Engage your visitors with spooky elements scattered around the website
#3 Quickly Establish The Discount Code
Every ecommerce platform now allows users to generate a discount code within seconds. The discount amount is totally up to you: 10%, 15%, 20%.
This one is a real quickie. All you need is a coupon code and a banner/pop-up.
I understand this might come off as lacking effort, but this tactic can still pull off a decent sales record for your site when the clock is ticking.
Moreover, you also want to do exactly this for any promotions down the line.
Plan of action
- Create the coupon code
- Design the banner/popup for promotion
- Notify customers about the sales (via email list)
#4 Bundle Up Your Products
As for any other holiday purchase, customers often prefer bulk options.
So, to make the purchase easier for your customers and increase the order value, selling products in groups is a great practice.
Even in the absence of a holiday, bundles are still one of the most profitable selling tactics. McKinsey’s study suggests that 35% of all Amazon orders come from “customers also buy” recommendations.
According to Forrester, the success rate of these recommendations is around 60%.
Hence, you should quickly put on bundles for your customers this Halloween season.
Simultaneously, you can make these more appealing with exclusive discounts or rewards to encourage customers further to finalize their orders.
Plan of action
Here is how you start selling products in groups easy-peasy lemon squeezy.
Whether it’s a pure bundle (contains all exclusive products that can only buy in the bundle) or a mixed bundle (includes products that customers can buy alone), let’s do this:
- Put benefits over features and saving deal
- Carefully seed the anchoring price
- Set the bundle pricing
- Learn market needs and turn them into solutions
- Try to brand your bundle under user-generated content (as in customer also buy, others also buy, top customers recommendations)
#5 Impress Customers With Show-stopping Deals
No one can say no to a great deal, especially during these high times, such as holidays.
The question here is how you paint your deal and hit directly at customers’ needs. And sadly, we can give you a definitive answer here.
Why?
Because your deals will get determined by two forces: market (outside) and your business (inside), you can get general ideas about the public’s opinions and needs during the season, but how you apply it to your business is entirely up to you.
But, that doesn’t mean we can provide you with delicious tips for generating your deals.
Here is your keyword: balance.
And I don’t mean balance the market’s demand and your supply. That’s basic economics.
Balance here refers to your own capacity and your goal.
Think of your ultimate goal for running this Halloween marketing campaign: to empty the inventory, to get the close-to-date/ out-of-date/ out-of-style product, to strike a higher sales record, or to improve the results (ultimate revenue).
Once you know what you want, you will be able to create your own discount/sales off campaign for the Halloween season, no hustle!
Plan of action
- Investigate the market. Find out what people want to buy this Halloween.
- List out your goals. Prioritize them into order.
- Based on your ultimate goal, calculate the sales you want.
#6 Offer Limited Edition
One more thing you can do with your products to intrigue your customers is to make them unique. In this case, Halloween limited edition.
This tactic is nothing new in the commercial world; the collectible is always a bait that never fails. Of course, this may be hard if your products require multiple steps within production and since it’s hard to customize for a new one.
However, if you offer flexible products or own the mean of production and can quickly pull this off, definitely use this marketing tactic.
Moreover, you can learn from Starbuck. Yeah, you heard me right – Starbuck.
Their signature drink – the Pumpkin Spice Latte, is a seasonal drink and only available from Sep to Dec. However, this reputation has grown outside of that bubble and has become a staple in Starbuck culture.
Let’s start brainstorming and create your business’s Pumpkin Spice Latte.
In a sense, this Halloween marketing tactic can be seen in the long run and actually generate a reliable and steady flow of revenue going forward.
Plan of action
- Research your category.
- Find out your unique/customizable products.
- Either create a collectible version of said product or start selling it as seasonal goods.
#7 Make It Social
There is no other way to push your exposure faster and broader than using social media. They have everything you need: the community, the engagement, the communication.
Hence, bring your best game to your social profile. Remember all the goodies you designed for your website campaign earlier, repurposing them!
Image, video, banner, GIFs – make use of these interactive media to catch customers’ attention and direct them to your near and dear website.
Another rising sub-genre of media that is highly community-focus is the hashtag. You can start off your hashtag via a competition/giveaway.
This way, you create your own community and attract potential customers to convert.
With social media and its distinctive characteristics, you have more than enough to foster your Halloween marketing ideas!
Plan of action
- Create a contest/giveaway
- Space out your posts (all social media has scheduled posting options)
- Always focus on a single theme/hashtag
- Two posts a day is the recommended
#8 Notify Your Customer-based via Email
Whatever your tactic is for this Halloween season, make full use of your already customers first.
First, it’s much easier to convert these people as they’ve already purchased and are interested in your products/services.
Second, email marketing will never get old.
Third, you can copy one Halloween email template and quickly customize then automatically send it out for your email list within minutes.
Always, your goal here is to make it joyful, playful, and engaging. Again, make sure customers feel happy with your accommodation, and recommendation is the fastest, most accessible way to make them buy more from you.
Plan of action
- Brainstorm your subject line. Make it Halloween-y
- Present the deal short-n-sweet
- Use emojis as they’re click-inducing and highly-trendy
- Always make it personal (use their own name)
- Choose the design near and dear to your brand
#9 Spend Money On Advertising
The paid ad is still the fastest way to kick-start a marketing campaign. And there is no exception to the rule here.
Here is a sad-but-true reality, no matter how good your campaign is, there is always a better alternative on the market.
Quietly waiting for your idea to blow up is naive at best and time-wasting at worst.
A great Google/social ad run with a calculated contribution plan is what you need to succeed in this sales season.
But now, you don’t have the time and resources to research keywords & trends. What is the solution here?
Answers: Copy the top players.
Launch a quick Google search and find out the top ecommerce stores in your niches. Then do exactly what they do.
Of course, customizing it to fit your brand is a must. But when you have the blueprint, the rest is more than easy to do.
Plan of action
- Launch an investigation on your niche’s top ecommerce establishment
- Copy their sentiment for Halloween’s approach
- Design Halloween promotion banners and media
- Run ads with a similar keyword target + redirect to your products at hand
- Smooth out the way to checkout and conversion
#10 Find The Sweet Spot
Halloween has been quite an exciting trend in the past few years. It peaks even in the summer and spaces out for a month.
Why?
One of the explanations lies within the inter-transmission of entertainment. During August (as you can see in the screenshot), multiple houses released their trailers and promotions for the Halloween movies.
Hence the term Halloween gets the hype indirectly. In the ideal world, we could have developed the Halloween season right there and then, or at least kick-started it.
But, it’s last-minute Halloween marketing ideas we are talking about here! So what are we going to do?
Do the similar, conduct your own research on Google Trends regarding your demographic, and find the sweet spot to run your campaign.
In this last week, the money shot is in the last three days of the month. At this time, people are running wild to find their wanted Halloween goods, and you can quickly capitalize on this.
Plan of action
- Day 1: Put the banner on the website and social media. Send out the promotion email.
- Day 2: Generate supporting posts and further decorate the site.
- Day 3, 4: Start seeding your promotion for the close circle.
- Day 5,6, 7: Run ads and smoothen the deals and checkout process.
#11. Play It Cool – Go For The Brand Image Route
Who said you could only focus on sales for a holiday?
This is also a great time to boost your brand image and make sure you fulfill your business’s social responsibility, especially during the rising popularity of Gen Z as the most significant eCommerce consumer.
Google did their deeds and found out that this generation highly preferred brands with the most social-friendly image.
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Therefore, to appeal more to this demographic, you should team up with the local or viral good cause campaign.
Is there any tricky part when it comes to doing charity?
Of course, it is. There is a possible yet manageable risk of appearing as “fake.” In a nutshell, people can mistake your effort for putting on a show only.
So, you need to carefully choose the organization you want to collaborate with.
Secondly, it is best to think of the plan first hand, list down all the possible risks, and figure out the solution. There is always room for mistakes, and you absolutely don’t want to miss out on them.
Then, carefully carry out your plan and be genuine about it.
Wrap Up
A successful Halloween promotion campaign will help your business to achieve growth goals, attract new customers, improve customer lifetime value, and many more.
The key to success is always keeping it simple and close to your core values.
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