Aside from being days of celebration, holidays serve as excellent opportunities for brands to create relevant content. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Whether the occasion is a federal holiday celebrated by the masses or a niche micro-holiday like National Hammock Day on July 22, these dates can serve as critical engagement tools within a brand awareness campaign.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When developing holiday-focused content, it\u2019s important to remember three core aspects to drive results:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To help bring these three aspects to life, we shared more detail and examples of how to use holidays for content creation below. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ensuring a holiday aligns with a brand\u2019s mission and messaging is imperative to the success of a holiday-centric campaign. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
A natural connection between a brand and a holiday is what allows the messaging within the content to appear both genuine and meaningful. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
A company that manufactures solar panels has a natural connection to Earth Day, while a veteran\u2019s organization has strong ties to both Independence Day and Veteran\u2019s Day and could host a community 5K.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A bakery could offer free chocolate chip cookies on August 4 to celebrate National Chocolate Chip Cookie Day while a cybersecurity company could use Data Privacy Week (January 24 – 28) to create a unique mini-series of how their employees go above and beyond to protect the data of their customers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The truth is, \u200bthere\u2019s a holiday celebrated every single day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s just a matter of determining if the holiday is a good fit for your brand or not. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As with any campaign, keeping customers at the forefront is crucial. Without a newsworthy angle that\u2019s relevant to target audiences, a holiday campaign can fall flat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That’s why a flower shop offering a discount for Mother\u2019s Day or a cinema hosting a scary movie marathon the week of Halloween makes sense. These companies created offerings with not only the holiday but their customers in mind as well. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
NOTE: You don\u2019t have to create an offer to go along with every holiday you choose to celebrate on social media. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Beyond monetary value, you can create value through content that educates and\/or entertains your audience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n For example, to celebrate World Book Day on April 23, the team at a marketing agency could individually share their favorite marketing books and why they enjoyed them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n By sharing their recommendations not only are they celebrating the holiday in a relevant way, but they\u2019re also showcasing their willingness to learn more about their industry. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Micro-holidays and mainstream holidays are excellent prompts for content creation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But simply slapping your logo on a picture of an American flag and saying \u201cHappy 4th of July!\u201d in the caption, won\u2019t really do much for your brand. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Because, as we\u2019ve seen in the examples shared above, adding your brand\u2019s spin to these holidays brings them to life. <\/p>\n\n\n\n And, to give you a better idea of how to implement holiday marketing tactics across various marketing channels let’s say a small business that specializes in handmade charcuterie boards is preparing to celebrate National Wine and Cheese Day on July 25. <\/p>\n\n\n\n To seamlessly attach their brand to this micro-holiday and the associated hashtag #NationalWineandCheeseDay they\u2019ve decided to partner with a local sommelier and an artisan cheese shop to host a wine and cheese pairing event. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Here are a few pre- and post-event ideas of how they can use social, email, and press release distribution to leverage this micro holiday: <\/p>\n\n\n\n People are busy and their calendars fill up faster than Usain Bolt in a 100-meter race. That\u2019s why it\u2019s important to promote your event well in advance to give people time to pencil it into their schedules. <\/p>\n\n\n\n For this event, the brand should start publishing promotional posts at least one month prior to the event.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Straightforward and informational posts have their place in your promotional plan. However, to build excitement and encourage people to attend the event, the brand can create teaser videos that showcase sample wine and cheese pairings with a call-to-action to \u201csave their seat.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n In addition to the brand promoting the event, the sommelier and cheese shop will promote it on their channels as well. <\/p>\n\n\n\n This approach expands the brand\u2019s reach beyond its audience and helps them tap into its co-host’s social followings to build awareness and generate interest. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The brand will create and distribute a press release using the inverted pyramid<\/a> to highlight the most important information about their upcoming event. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Distributing a press release two weeks<\/strong> before the event date gives the brand time to pitch early to the media to create earned media opportunities that\u2019ll expand their reach and build awareness which will hopefully boost attendance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We\u2019ll pretend this brand has a robust email marketing strategy in place so they\u2019ve already collected and nurtured a segmented list of local users. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Research says the ideal number of pre-event emails is five.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n With this in mind, they\u2019ll use their local list of email contacts to promote their event with a consistent but not overwhelming outreach cadence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Here\u2019s a sample of the emails the brand could send:<\/p>\n\n\n\n You\u2019ve likely heard of the term, FOMO before. But, if you haven\u2019t it stands for Fear of Missing Out. <\/p>\n\n\n\n A post-event press release is an excellent tool to use to create that feeling in the people who didn\u2019t attend your event. Share the highlights of your event, talk about the successes, and what made the event worth talking about. The goal is to share information that will make people who didn\u2019t attend want to attend the next event you plan. <\/p>\n\n\n\n NOTE: When drafting the content, don\u2019t forget the importance of the press release format<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Send a \u201cThank You\u201d email to everyone in attendance. Here are some items to include in this email:<\/p>\n\n\n\nCompelling Content<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Pre-event promotion<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Social media<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Press release<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Email<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Post-event:<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Press release<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Email<\/strong><\/h4>\n\n\n\n