Pre-Holiday Email Marketing Ideas For Small Businesses

Like it or not, the pre-holiday email season is already upon us.

Don’t wait until it’s the full-blown holiday season to prepare.

Now’s the time to take steps to ensure that your emails will reach the inbox… engage your audience… and achieve greater results. 

Make a list and check it twice

We’re not talking about the naughty-or-nice list; we’re talking about your email list. Take a good look at hard and soft bounce rates, and make sure your list is squeaky clean before launching your holiday email campaigns. Remember, a good email list is more about quality than quantity.

If you still feel you need to grow your list prior to the holiday push, run a contest on your sites (website and social networking sites) to encourage email signup. But be forewarned that names acquired through contests usually won’t turn out to be your best customers for the long term.

Get to know your customers better

In order for you to deliver more targeted email messages, you need to know your subscribers’ preferences. Now’s the time to survey your customers. Be sure to find out not only what they like, but what their gift recipients like.

You don’t have to be a chain like Cici’s Pizza to conduct a consumer survey. And you don’t have to offer an incentive along the lines of a free meal (although some sort of incentive can boost response rates). Kudos to Cici’s for making the focus on the consumer. The email also uses the verbiage “quick survey” to allay customers’ fears of taking a time-consuming survey.

Cici’s uses the pre-holiday email season to get information from customers.

Lighten up (with frequency, that is)

Consumers are bombarded with months of holiday marketing in all channels. You can reduce the chance of your subscribers suffering from email fatigue by cutting back on the number of emails you send in the weeks and months prior to the holiday season. That way, when you do ramp up holiday email campaigns, your subscribers will be less likely to delete your emails – and more likely to open them.

Set the tone

Your emails don’t always have to sell, sell, sell.

A heartfelt Thanksgiving thank-you email, like this one from Doctors Foster and Smith, can go a long way toward building rapport with your customers. This well-crafted email also reminds subscribers to think of others during the holiday season.

Doctors Foster And Smith is no small business, but you can take a cue from their email strategy.

Take inventory of emails past

Look back at previous years’ holiday emails. How did they compare, year over year? See if you can uncover trends, and use that knowledge to shape this year’s holiday campaigns.

Of course, you’ll need to take physical inventory, too – of products, staff and other resources needed to make it through the holidays without a hitch.

Make sure you have a white(listed) Christmas

It’s imperative that you follow email marketing best practices. You can’t risk having your company blacklisted during the most important time of the year for retail. Keep an eye on your deliverability rates, and be proactive if any issues arise.

Follow these basic guidelines, and you’ll be on your way to a very merry email holiday season.

Tagged in: Cici's Pizza, Doctor Fosters And Smith, Small Business