When building your promotional calendar, you should consider which holidays are most relevant to your business. Holidays are a great tool for marketing because they’re predetermined events that almost everyone in your audience will recognize. Looking for a reason to hold a flash sale or promote a certain part of your business? Use a holiday.
We recently shared with you the 7 most important holidays for promoting your business. This week, we’re taking a look at 8 more holidays you can use in your promotional calendar. Not all of these holidays will work for every business, so don’t be discouraged if you can only use a few.
Once you’ve picked the best holidays for your business from these lists, you’ll be ready to fill out your promotional calendar!
1. Valentine’s Day.
Valentine’s Day is all about love. Could your products or services be a romantic gift for someone to give their partner or spouse? If so, it should be easy to market your business on Valentine’s Day. Remind your audience what a special gift your products would be, and maybe hold a flash sale to encourage people to buy around the holiday.
But it’s not just romantic love that we celebrate on Valentine’s Day. Even if your business isn’t particularly romantic, you can still use the holiday in your promotional calendar.
Encourage your audience to purchase a gift card for their loved ones. Gift cards or vouchers for useful services may not be the most romantic gesture, but it says, “I love you and think about you.” By purchasing a gift card to your business, your customers are saving their loved ones time, money, and effort.
Another way to celebrate Valentine’s Day is by sharing your love for your customers. Spend the week leading up to Valentine’s Day reminding your audience how much you love them. Your business wouldn’t be here without your loyal customer base. Share the love by sending a thank-you email with a discount code or free shipping.
Need some inspiration? HubSpot has a list of 8 great Valentine’s Day marketing campaigns, including one for Hidden Valley Ranch dressing. If ranch dressing can pull off a Valentine’s marketing campaign, you can, too.
Valentine’s Day always falls on February 14.
2. New Year’s Day.
The new year can often be a difficult time for businesses as consumers are more hesitant to make purchases after the December holidays. But depending on your business, you might be able to make a New Year’s Day campaign work.
Most consumers are making goals and resolutions at the start of the year. They want to be healthier, more organized, more responsible, and more active. They might resolve to learn a new skill or craft or give up a bad habit. Think about how your business can fit into those goals.
During the first week or two of the year, encourage your audience to engage with your business as part of their New Year’s resolutions. Send out free checklists or helpful blog posts with tips for making healthier choices. Position your business as a guide or coach who can help them reach their goals.
New Year’s Day always falls on January 1.
3. Spring and Fall Equinox.
We wrote earlier about using the Summer Solstice as a holiday for your business, even if you don’t explicitly talk about the solstice in your marketing materials. The changing of the seasons is something everyone can relate to (as long as your audience is in the same hemisphere), and the start of a new season is often a reason to celebrate.
The Spring Solstice is an opportunity to talk about new beginnings, nature, and big life changes. Remind your audience about those New Year’s resolutions they made a few months ago, and show how your business can be the solution to achieving their goals.
If your business deals with plants or the outdoors, spring is a wonderful time to promote yourself. Spring is usually a time of pleasant weather, blooming flowers, and adventures in nature.
For the Fall Equinox, encourage your audience to engage with your business as a form of self-care. Students are going back to school, the weather is getting colder, and people are gearing up for the holidays. Invite your customers to take a break from the autumn chill and stressful schedules by shopping with your business.
The next Spring Equinox in the Northern Hemisphere is March 20, 2023. The next Fall Equinox is September 22, 2022.
4. Heritage months and activism holidays.
You’re already aware that February is Black History Month, and you probably know June is LGBTQ Pride Month. But those two are just the beginning.
May is Asia American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month. March is Women’s History Month. September 15–October 15 is Hispanic Heritage Month. There are awareness days, weeks, and months for almost every minority group and social justice movement you can think of.
Heritage months and activism holidays aren’t about selling your products. They’re about participating in a conversation, uplifting minorities in your industry, and raising awareness about social justice issues.
Maybe during March, you’ll donate some of your profits to an organization that empowers women in your industry. In May, you can showcase your Asian American and Pacific Islander employees, colleagues, and partners on social media. In late September, you can share little-known stories and facts about Hispanic professionals in your industry.
It’s important to be respectful during heritage months. Don’t pander, and don’t try to force your business into a space it doesn’t fit. (If you only sell men’s clothing, you probably don’t have much to do with Women’s History Month.) It’s better to fully participate in just a few activism holidays than to lazily insert your business into a dozen of them.
The State Department recognizes these heritage months. The Social Justice Resource Center also has a list of activism and awareness dates.
5. Social media holidays.
National Donut Day. National Talk Like a Pirate Day. World Emoji Day.
These “holidays” are everywhere. No matter your industry, you can almost certainly find a social media holiday for it.
You can’t celebrate every social media holiday, or else you’d be celebrating every day of the year. You should only choose the holidays that are relevant to your business and audience.
For example, National Proofreading Day (March 8) is an excellent day for the Sigl copywriters, but probably not very interesting to your audience. You might find some traction with National Hat Day (January 15), World Book Day (April 23), International Cat Day (August 8), or Greasy Foods Day (October 25). It all depends on what products and services you sell.
Pick a handful of social media holidays, but no more than one per month. Plan on posting to social media on these days with relevant content, using the appropriate hashtags and inviting your audience to join you in celebrating. Consider offering small discounts related to the holidays in addition to your social media posts.
See HubSpot’s list of over 200 social media holidays here.
6. Memorial Day, President’s Day, and other government holidays.
Have you ever noticed that furniture stores and car dealerships tend to hold frequent flash sales, especially around holidays unrelated to their businesses? What does President’s Day have to do with buying a new mattress? Why should someone buy a kitchen appliance on the Fourth of July?
It all comes down to urgency.
Sales and promotions during government holidays aren’t really about “celebrating.” They’re about creating a sense of urgency by attaching the sale to an impending deadline. As soon as the long weekend is over, the sale ends.
It may seem silly, but it works.
Many people have come to expect sales on 3-day weekends, according to U.S. News. If your business sells home goods or other large purchases, you can probably start holding sales on 3-day weekends and other government holidays.
Neil Patel has some great ideas for Memorial Day sales, which you can apply to many other government holidays, too. If you sell products in different colors, consider discounting red, white, and blue products on patriotic holidays, too.
Upcoming government holidays include Labor Day (September 5, 2022), President’s Day (February 20, 2023), Memorial Day (May 29, 2023), and Independence Day (July 4, 2023).
7. Leap Day.
Leap Day only happens once every 4 years. Because it’s a rare occasion, you can use scarcity and urgency to encourage your audience to make a purchase. Instead of “once in a lifetime,” Leap Day is “once in four years.”
There are plenty of ways to make a Leap Day-themed sale:
- Buy 3, get the 4th item free
- 29% off certain items
- Mark down prices to a number ending in 29
- Special deals that only happen once in 4 years
Try these ideas by Groupon and Crazy Domains the next time Leap Day rolls around. Encourage your customers to make the most of their “extra day” by spending it at your business!
The next Leap Day is February 29, 2024.
8. Your business’s birthday.
If you don’t already celebrate your business’s “birthday,” you should. Your business’s birthday or anniversary is a special holiday unique to you, and it’s an opportunity to celebrate what makes your business special.
Use your business’s “age” when coming up with a birthday promotion. For your 10th birthday, give your audience a 10% discount code. For your 7th birthday, make a list of your top 7 favorite products you sell, and maybe combine them into a discounted bundle. You can make a huge celebration out of your “golden” birthday (the year that your age is the same as the date, such as turning 18 on the 18th) with gold designs and graphics.
If you’d rather call it an anniversary, consider theming each year around traditional anniversary gifts. For example, when your business makes it to 25 years, have a silver-themed anniversary celebration.
Your customers aren’t likely to know about your business’s anniversary or birthday beforehand, so you need to send out some communications telling them to mark their calendars. On the day of, hold a flash sale, a livestream on social media, or an in-person event (or all of the above). Thank all of your customers for helping your business make it another year, and give them a sneak peek of what’s to come in the next year.
Is the idea of putting together a promotional calendar overwhelming? Do you need help figuring out which holidays are the best ones for promoting your business? Schedule a call with Sigl Creative, and let’s talk about ways we can leverage holidays to grow your business.