How to Promote Heavy Before the Holidays: No Matter Your Industry

Whether you wait all year to cash in during the holidays or you dread each week that brings you closer to the inevitable slowdown, promoting is your best option when the season comes.

There are many businesses that can offer customers incentives to purchase before the end of the year, such as tax breaks, insurance benefits or heavy discounts. Whatever your industry, there is usually something that can be done to capitalize on the time of the year.

What should I offer?

A good way to market for holiday spending is to determine if you can offer a loss leader. A loss leader is something you offer that you either break even on or lose money on just to get a customer “in the door.” Many times the customer will buy more than just what was offered in the promotion, which makes up for the "loss." This strategy is why Wal-Mart can afford to have such low prices? They anticipate that every person coming in the door will spend an average of $45 – even if they only intended to stop in for a small or sale item. So, even if someone came in to buy the super-discounted item that was on sale that week, they would end up picking up several other items before they make it to the cash register.

Here’s another example of a loss leader: An optometrist offers a pair of sunglasses at 50 percent off with a purchase of one pair at full price for a limited time during the holiday. Someone could buy themselves a new pair and then one for their spouse for Christmas or Hanukkah. Don't forget, there are many holiday shoppers that end up buying gifts for themselves when they are shopping for others.

In another case, a jeweler can consider having a sale where the matching earrings for a designer ring is offered for a steep discount. Or, if the jewelry designer does not allow discounts (many do not), another non-brand piece of jewelry can be offered for a percentage off. Imagine all the men who would buy more just to get that extra diamond so they can appear even more generous to the women in their lives (moms, sisters, wives, etc.).

Let’s try a hard one. A dentist (because who really wants to go to the dentist for the holidays?). A dentist informs patients that they might lose their medical benefits for the year if they have not used them before Dec. 31. Many benefit plans are able to be used during one calendar year and expire the last day of that year. Think of all the dental work people have been putting off, thinking they had benefits to use whenever they wanted, only to find out they won't have those benefits if they don't use them before year’s end. The office would, of course, go all out with a special Christmas offer of free teeth whitening.

For businesses that promote only to other businesses, think of what they can offer before the end of the year that would not only pad the books profitably, but also allow them to deliver products and services well into the new year. Allowing companies an incentive to pre-pay for their next year's business is a can’t-miss way to get customers. There are even tax breaks for some companies that do this, and many will do it just so they don't have to report so much income at the end of the year.

Starting to get the idea? I could keep going, but the purpose of this article is to get you thinking creatively about your own holiday income.

Now, Promote it!

Once you figure out what you are going to offer, get started on the promotion immediately. Direct-mail postcards mailed to your target market multiple times are not only cost-effective but also targeted to promote your offer to the people that will be the most likely to respond. But to make your new ideas come to fruition, you have to start early. Six months is optimum, three months will do -- and two months is still better than not promoting at all.

Remember, get all of your staff excited about your holiday promotions so they talk it up with every single customer. Excitement is infectious, and even if one particular customer does not bite, they might just go tell another who will!

About Joy Gendusa Communication with customers has earned her Inc. magazine's recognition as the nation's fastest growing direct-mail postcard-marketing firm with 2007 revenues close to $19 million. Gendusa began in 1998 with zero investment capital. Today, her Clearwater, Fla., firm called PostcardMania employs more than 150 people, prints four million and mails two million postcards representing 31,000-plus customers in more than 350 industries each week. Visit www.postcardmania.com.