Preparing for Christmas! 5 things you should be doing now for the holiday season

Yes, the kids have only just gone back to school and they’re replacing the BBQs with Halloween decorations in the shops but now is the perfect time to be preparing your business for Christmas.

This time of year flies by so quickly that getting a Christmas plan together now and making those initial steps toward completing it is essential if you’re wanting to capitalise on the holiday season for your business; whether that’s bringing in new customers, selling more to your existing clients or simply strengthening your brand presence.

So, here are the 5 things that I suggest you do now to prepare for Christmas.

1 – Make sure your website is up to date and working well

Your website underpins all the marketing and promotional activities you do for your business. Whether that’s social media, printed advertising or media campaigns – it’s your website you direct people to for that sale to happen or contact to be made.

With that in mind, it’s vital that your website is looking its best, performing well in terms of functionality and makes it easy for those sales and enquiries to happen.

• Review your copy and ensure it’s up to date and relevant.
• Create those seasonal specific pages or update them from last year’s version.
• Ensure your themes and plugins are updated and working well if you use WordPress.
• Check Google Search Console and Analytics for any issues with pages not indexed, broken links, etc.

2 – Increase your social media marketing

We all know that there is a build-up to Christmas. We start to see items appear in stores, magazines start talking about preparations for the big event and you’ll soon see posters for Christmas shows and pantos wherever you turn.

The same build-up applies to your business. Whether you’re an occasional social media marketer or it’s a key part of your strategy, now is the time to be getting consistent and building up your audience so when you do start those seasonal specific posts, your potential customers are ready and waiting to see them.

3 – Plan your product promotion

Whether it’s products or services that you’re offering, if you are offering a seasonal promotion you need to start preparing for that now.

Decide on what you want your promotions to be, whether that’s discounts, seasonal specific products or services, or special offers like buy one get one, etc. Then plan a timeline around those promotions. If the products/services are specific to Christmas, such as a planning or gift buying service for example, when are people likely to need it (October/November in this case) and when should you be marketing it (now!).

Once you have a timeline in place, you can create your marketing materials, blogs and social media posts ready to schedule and post as appropriate.

4 – Ensure you have good processes in place

If you are expecting a surge of sales and clients this Christmas, can you handle the additional workload with the processes you have in place now?

Think about your payment gateway and any limits you might have, do you need to have a conversation with your bank to ensure you’re getting the best deal and can serve the additional customers?

If you onboard new clients via video call, do you have the capacity for a sudden influx? Can you find ways to save time, such as using Google forms to get the essential information you need reducing a potentially hour-long call to just twenty or thirty minutes?

If you post things out to your customers, take into account the additional strain on the delivery network at this time of year. Are there better alternatives in terms of courier/tracking options that will enable you to provide better customer service?

Now is the time to be changing and improving your processes and systems ready for the Christmas rush.

5 – Consider gifts and cards for your existing clients

We can spend so much time looking for new customers and ways to make sales at this time of year that it can be all too easy to forget about your current clients.

It’s important for all your clients to feel valued within your business, so consider what you can do to achieve this. For a service-oriented business, this might be as simple as sending a digital Christmas card and donating the cost of physical cards/postage to charity, sending small gifts or even hosting a small get together if your clients are local.

For a product-based business, touching base with previous and existing customers offering a special discount or gift when they order can be another way to ensure they feel valued and recognised by you.

I hope this blog has given you some ideas of how to get started with preparing for Christmas now and why it’s so important to do so. If you need any help with any of these points, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us at Banks’ Business Solutions, we’ll be happy to help.