Promotions for the Holidays
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The winter holidays are by far the biggest spending season, and Cyber Monday – the Monday after Thanksgiving Day – is the top spending day of the year. Media companies have the opportunity to generate TONS of revenue, engagement, and new email opt-ins in November and December. To learn how to make the most of this opportunity with contests, ballots, and ecommerce promotions, check out the Promotions for the Holidays webinar.
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Promotions for the Holidays
- 1. Promotions FOR THE HOLIDAYS #PromotionsLab
- 2. HOW TO INTERACT WITH US #PromotionsLab GoToWebinar™ Questions Panel Follow us on Twitter @secondstreetlab Want to win an exclusive prize? Be the one who tweets the most with our hashtag #PromotionsLab Note: We are recording this webinar and you will receive an email with links to the recording and slide deck.
- 3. WHO WE ARE #PromotionsLab
- 4. SPEAKERS Matt Chaney Director of Affiliate Success @mattchaney #PromotionsLab Julie Foley Director of Affiliate Success @julie_foley Liz Crider Affiliate Success Manager @emcrider
- 5. AGENDA • Spending & How to Get Started • Ecommerce Promotions • Contest • Ballots • Tools for Success • Takeaways • QA #PromotionsLab
- 7. HOW TO GET STARTED 3 Months Plan #PromotionsLab 2 Months Sell 1 Month Promote Launch
- 9. WHAT ARE E-COMMERCE PROMOTIONS? What are Ecommerce Promotions? #PromotionsLab
- 10. TOP ONLINE SHOPPING DAYS #PromotionsLab
- 11. DEAL QUALITY CHECKLIST Evergreen category Few restrictions #PromotionsLab Appropriate price point Popular merchant Seasonally relevant Unique & fresh
- 13. MULTI – MERCHANT CARDS $81K+ $112K+ $37K+ $71K+ #PromotionsLab
- 14. SINGLE – MERCHANT CARDS $10K+ $12K+ #PromotionsLab $16K
- 15. SINGLE – MERCHANT CARDS $10K+ $12K+ #PromotionsLab $16K
- 16. CARD RECOMMENDATIONS Why it Works #PromotionsLab Focuses on mass appeal categories. High price point. Works as a standalone promotion. When to Launch Launch in late November to get a jump on the holiday shopping season. How to Schedule Golf cards can run all season. Spa cards, 2-3 weeks. How to Promote Tie-in with related content. Run alongside other promotions. Heavy up promotions at strategic times of the year. Look for unique offerings from your company & media.
- 17. 12 DAYS OF DEALS #PromotionsLab
- 18. 12 DAYS OF DEALS #PromotionsLab The Modesto Bee Modesto, CA 12 Days of dealsaver $40,685 Gross 2,192 Offers Sold
- 19. STRAIGHT UP DEALS UpperMichigansSource Negaunee, MI Straight Up Deals $13,350 Gross 952 Offers Sold #PromotionsLab
- 20. 12 DAYS OF DEALS RECOMMENDATIONS Why it Works #PromotionsLab Limited inventory. Focused prospect list. When to Launch Launch the first week of December. How to Schedule Start one deal each day – week days only. Let them run until 12/24. How to Promote Run a sweepstakes ahead of launch, feature merchants, giveaway all 12 deals as grand prize. Run countdown promotions. Run a “Last Chance” email around 12/19.
- 22. CYBER WEEK #PromotionsLab Post-Bulletin Rochester, MN Cyber Week Deal Store $19,086 Gross 2,192 Offers Sold
- 23. SALES: JAN. TO DEC. 2013 #PromotionsLab Cyber Week
- 24. HOLIDAY STORE The Post and Courier Charleston, SC Holiday Gift Guide $85,403 Gross 2,192 Offers Sold #PromotionsLab
- 25. ANCHOR DEAL #PromotionsLab $48,776 Children’s Museum of Lowcountry 1,214 Offers Sold
- 26. CYBER + STOCKING STUFFER #PromotionsLab $117,661 Gross $48,025 Gross The Quad-City Times Davenport, IA 165,686! Combined Gross Revenue
- 27. #PromotionsLab CYBER + STOCKING STUFFER
- 28. SEASONAL STORE RECOMMENDATIONS Why it Works #PromotionsLab Work with a variety of advertisers. Create a big shopping event around key holidays. Higher volume of deals to encourage shopping. When to Launch Cyber Store: 12/1 – 12/7 Holiday/Stocking Stuffer: 12/8 – 12/24 How to Schedule Launch all deals at one time. Run them for the length of the store. How to Promote Make a big splash with high-impact ads. Feature merchants’ whenever possible. Leverage all of your assets.
- 30. HOLIDAY LIGHTS The RoanokeTimes | Roanoke, VA #PromotionsLab
- 31. CHRISTMAS CHOIR COMPETITION WKRQ-FM | Cincinnati, OH #PromotionsLab
- 32. SANTA PHOTOS GONE BAD The Pantagraph | Bloomington, IL #PromotionsLab
- 33. 31 DAYS OF CHRISTMAS Popular Woodworking #PromotionsLab
- 35. #PromotionsLab
- 36. #PromotionsLab
- 38. RESULTS #PromotionsLab $70,000 in revenue 50% increase!
- 39. #PromotionsLab TOOLS FOR SUCCESS
- 42. CARD TEMPLATES #PromotionsLab SPA CARD
- 43. #PromotionsLab
- 44. #PromotionsLab MAY 28, 2014 132456 Your Name Here Matt Chaney Deal Sales secondstreet.com/university
- 46. #PromotionsLab PLAN YOUR CALENDAR
- 47. HOLIDAY CALENDAR #PromotionsLab Promotion When to Run Holiday Sweepstakes #1 November 18-29 Holiday Shopping Ballot October-November Cyber Week Store December 2-8 UGC Photo Contest December 2-23 Holiday Sweepstakes #2 December 2-8 HolidayTheme Store December 9-25
- 48. #PromotionsLab ALIGN WITH CURRENT INITIATIVES
- 49. #PromotionsLab
- 50. RUN A BALLOT #PromotionsLab
- 51. #PromotionsLab
- 52. RUN A HOLIDAY ECOMMERCE PROMOTION #PromotionsLab
- 53. ECOMMERCE PROMOTIONS #PromotionsLab $81K+
- 54. QUESTIONS? Matt Chaney Director of Affiliate Success @mattchaney #PromotionsLab Julie Foley Director of Affiliate Success @julie_foley Liz Crider Affiliate Success Manager @emcrider
Editor's Notes
- Liz Comment & questions on Twitter Questions Recording Survey at the end – your feedback is welcomed Whomever tweets the most using the hashtag will get a killer prize!
- Liz Our newest product – Voter’s Choice
- Chaney
- Spending was up 3.5% over 2012, though was only expected to grow 2%, and continues to climb with more people increasingly buying using mobile devices. $61 billion being spent overall Average American spends $740 dollars on holiday gifts
- Plan - NOW Set your goals Pick your ecommerce promotion format Create the package for advertisers Getting sales materials together Sell - October Target advertisers that ran last year or if in doubt think about deals that will help you prepare for the holidays, enjoy the holidays or make great gifts; prioritize those evergreen categories Promote - November Your promotional package will be a HUGE selling point to close deals; put something together that is multi-platform, includes offerings that are unique to your company and/or your media type; leverage all of your assets Launch - December As we saw earlier, spending is happening in early December, so work backward with that date in mind.
- Let’s start with Ecommerce Promotions. Have to also give a shout out to my two precious little girls Maggie and Julianna that you see here. Julie and I both couldn’t resist sharing a couple of holiday-themed photos our kids, so look for those throughout.
- Any campaign where the goal is an online transaction by the consumer – much like the end goal of a contest is an entry or a ballot, a vote Just one or two focused promotions a year can easily generate six figures while a more robust program can be a multimillion $ opportunity. The best part of all is that these promotions is that they can drive the results that advertisers are looking for to grow their business and help you the media company target new and existing advertisers. Also, with so much spending shifting to e-commerce these days, media companies must seek out the opportunity to put themselves in the middle of the transaction between buyers and sellers. Speaking of ecommerce, online spending is at an all-time high. And much of that money is spent around the holidays.
- Here’s a list of the top ten online spending days for 2013. 9 out of 10 are in December with Black Friday being the exception. Though the shopping cycle was thrown off slightly by the fact that Cyber Monday was in December last year, and will be again this year, there continues to be growth in online spending. 2013 Holiday Season U.S. Desktop E-Commerce Spending Reaches Record $46.5 Billion, Up 10 Percent vs. Year Ago The reigning champ of online sales is still Cyber Monday, but the bottomline is that those first two weeks of December are when you have to strike to maximize your earnings and results for advertisers. We’re going to talk about a number of ways you can do that whether you have a deals program or not.
- The most important thing to keep in mind is that you have to have high quality deals. Period. There’s no way around that. And you want to run deals that will appeal to your audience. Look at your audience demographics and tailor deals to their needs and interests. Certainly with the holidays in mind, I’d add another item list is: make sure it is “Giftable”. That means “no toe fungus treatments” and “weightloss supplements”. Those just don’t send the right message to the giftee and they don’t make sense for your store. A nice massage offer or restaurant gift card, that sounds more like it.
- Up first is cards. And these are physical punch cards that get delivered to consumers via the mail, and they fall into two main buckets – multi merchant and single merchant.
- Multi-merchant cards allow you to work with a variety of advertisers all offering the same deal. The most successful cards focus on those mass appeal categories - like golf, ski and food. It is not by coincidence that you’re only see golf cards on this slide because they opportunity here is gigantic. Within the recreation, golf is #1 and among all categories, it is in the top 3. The key to success here is to make sure all the merchants have the same offer – for example a round of golf at each course - and to promote the card heavily throughout the campaign which, in the case of golf, can stretch from November all the way through the summer. Just about every card that you see here launched in November or December of last year.
- With single merchant spa cards - you are focusing on awesome businesses that can support fulfillment of these cards. You will likely do a rev split on these - but the price point is high and the appeal is HUGE!
- With single merchant spa cards - you are focusing on awesome businesses that can support fulfillment of these cards. You will likely do a rev split on these - but the price point is high and the appeal is HUGE!
- Categories: golf, ski, spa and dining Price Point: Cards are sold for $99-$150, which helps to raise the average price point of deals on your site (which in turn means more revenue for you) Standalone: Cards are very manageable and have a set start and end date similar to a contest and they have limited space. Leverage all assets: print/onair, email, social, mobile Related content: promote in golf section of newspaper or promo ads during sports coverage Other promotions: cards are flexible and can be included with other promotions like the ones we are going to talk about or golf special sections Unique: front page mentions or have on-air talent who have a passion for golf talk about their favorite holes
- These are similar to a theme weeks in that you run a group of deals around a theme and have a limited number of spots available, so only the best of the best can participate. Let’s look at a couple of examples of markets having success with this model.
- The Modesto Bee took a slightly different approach with their “12 days of dealsaver” store. They put a big emphasis on “gifting” and set the deals up to only be valid after Christmas. By doing it this way, they gave the merchant an incentive to participate by pushing redemption into a slower period and gave the recipients some unique gifts - the most popular in their store was Fun Works, an unlimited pass to an activity center with mini golf, bumper cars and other games. I wouldn’t recommend this for all stores, but clearly it has been working and has helped them secure high quality advertisers who were reluctant to participate.
- UpperMichiganSource.com is a TV station in a very small market, DMA 180, and they run a regular deals program and added this promotion to take advantage of the holidays. This is an annual event for them and last year they generated over $13K in revenue. During the time this promotion was running, they saw a 47% increase in average sales. Ne-gan-ee They created an in house 30 second spot promoting the store that ran 2 weeks before the store started helping prime consumers for the launch of their store. That was in addition to more than 20 donut spots on both of their location stations that highlighted the store and featured the advertiser. 20 :30 SPOTS ON TV 6 AND FOX UP (PROMO FEATURED DONUT) EMAIL BLAST X2 TO OVER 50,000 REGISTERED BUYERS FEATURED ON DEALS DETAIL PAGE FOR 12 FULL DAYS FEATURED ON 12 DEALS OF CHRISTMAS STORE FOR 12 DAYS o FACEBOOK, TWITTER, UPPERMICHIGANSSOURCE.COM, MOBILE APP
- Inventory: with only 12 spots you want to focus on only the top merchants. Pull a list of your top deals from November and December and prioritize those. Given the limited availability, make a contest out of it internally, see who can fill the first spot, the most spots and post the results publically. 12 Days of Deals is a great approach if you’re a site that only runs weekly deals or are a site just looking to capitalize on holiday spending. This is a manageable approach that can work as a standalone program, complement an existing program or be a great way to grow digital revenue for a core media iniative you may already have planned.
- Seasonal Stores are a way to give your site a revenue boost at key times of the year. They work best when tied to specific holidays and seasonal promotions
- The Post Bulletin and their site RochesterMN.com ran this store during Cyber Week to capitalize on all of the online shopping going on then. This is a very small market southeast of Minneapolis. They run an ongoing deals program and added a store to help boost revenue. And boy, did it! They ran 16 deals and generated over $19K. There top deals were dining and golf. They even were able to secure two franchise restaurants – Perkins and Great Harvest Bread Co – showing that there is opportunity with this segment as well, so don’t overlook it. Let me show just want an impact this store had on their program….
- For me, this speaks volume to how important cyber Monday and the holidays are for ecommerce. The spike in sales in undeniable. This is why you need to start planning your strategy today! It is this important. For many of our partners, this is the biggest revenue generator of the year! But it does take some focus and getting yourself setup for success by selling in October or even earlier. And offering merchants a great promotional package.
- The Post and Courier’s Charleston Deals Today program approached the holidays a little different. Instead of a short burst of deals for Cyber Week, they took a longer term approach and ran deals from November through December under the banner of “Holiday Specials” and at different times highlighted deals to prepare for the holidays, to enjoy the holidays and to give as gifts from tickets to a production of A Night Before Christmas to golf lessons to carpet cleaning and mobile detailing and the big one - Membership to the local Children’s museum, which I’ll talk about a littler more on the next slide. They did the all of the regular promotion you’ve heard us talk about before: print ads, online ads, emails, but what I really loved about this case study was how they leveraged non-traditional assets as well. For example, the newspaper had a big presence at Second Sunday, a popular local holiday event in Charleston. At the booth, they had a santa posing for pictures with kids and families, which drew a large crowd, and while the crowd was waiting they handed out their holiday guide, which you see here, that had included logos from all of the participating deal store participants. This is an event that many of those small businesses couldn’t be a part of due to cost, so having the Post and Courier push their names out to attendees was a big selling point for them. Also, Their fan base on social media is over 45,000 strong, which is impressive in and of itself, but they leverage that unique asset, run by the news department, to promote certain key deals and merchants (not to mention announce winners for contests), so they offered a promotional package to the advertisers that they couldn’t even buy. That made this a very successful store and promotion. There’s one other thing they did that I believe is a really smart approach to drive more sales, and that’s where they Children’s museums comes in.
- The $40 for $80 Children’s Museum of the Lowcountry deal was for a half-off family membership for one year. They knew this deal was going to be a hit, so used the draw of this offer to raise awareness for their holiday store and guide. The deal is featured once a year only through The Post and Courier, and we advertise it as a Holiday Gift idea. There are no limits on how many offers we can sell They did a huge marketing push for the advertiser – including the Half page print ad on the left and homepage takeover on the right. This promotional package, which also included several emails, other print and online ads, was what closed the deal for them. Claire, the salesperson involved, reinforced how their audience aligned with the target audience of the museum making it a win-win-win for all involved. So, when you’re prospecting and out looking considering which deals to run, think about your big advertisers and ones that would be a good fit for your store and make them an anchor deal in your store to draw even more people in.
- The QC Times continue to reach new heights with their holiday promotions. They do a Cyber Store and Stocking Stuff combination. They use these stores a complement to their deals program and run as a companion to print special sections. In total, their stores brought in nearly $400K for them last year. They would tell you the keys to success are to keep your deal quality high and to plan them well in advance not to mention giving them a ton of promotion to make it a special event for the consumer and advertiser.
- Here is just a sampling of the advertising that QCT did to promote their store. What I love about these is that not only do they feature the name and logo of the business, but they also give a brief description of the deal. Their artwork is consistent across mediums. They also made a big push online and certainly with email including a Last Chance email to spur last minute sales.
- Advertisers: But keep in mind that deal quality has to be maintained. A good number to shoot for is 10-15 at a minimum to ensure you have variety of price, category and location. Shopping events: seasonal stores work best when tied to a key holiday such as Cyber Week, mother’s day and father’s day. They make a great complement to a big internal sales iniative. Not everything makes a great store, so be choosy. Volume: the higher volumes gives your consumers more to explore and add to their carts. Look for deals that complement each other such as holiday lights festival and a nutcrakcer performance. Promote: Also, I would add that this combination of two stores is really best suited for deal sites that are able to close a high volume of deals. I wouldn’t recommend this to everyone, but I wanted to show you the revenue potential that these seasonal stores can have.
- Julie sponsors | malls, craft stores, theaters, restaurants, grocery stores, catering companies
- Holiday Lights Contest Sponsored by K Guard (gutter installation) 40 great entries Thousands of votes My favorite was the “hokie house” a seasonal lighting display with a Virginia Tech Hokie theme. Drive by and see the Hokie bird cheering, elves trying to put up lights, and of course Santa and his reindeer taking flight with Rudolph at the helm! Make sure you put your windows down so you can listen to your favorite Christmas music that is synchronized to the lights! If you are a fan of Virginia Tech, or just love to see Christmas lights, this is a must see! sponsors | malls, craft stores, theaters, restaurants, grocery stores, catering companies Christmas Choir Competition Santa Photos Gone Bad
- Christmas Choir Competition MP3 contest Local morning show giving away $18k to local school choirs!! Sponsored by local credit union and book store 57 entries from local schools! 180k votes!!
- And MY all time favorite holiday contest theme: Santa Photos Gone Bad Sponsored by Gingerbread House – a local toy store (perfect!) 57 entries 10k votes 156 email optins for the sponsor!
- Sponorsored by Lee Valley Tools 31 days of giveaways! 345k entries!!
- The Roanoke Times The daily newspaper for 19-counties across Southwest Virginia. One of the best-read newspapers in the U.S. Reaches more than 200,000 adults (weekday) and a quarter-million readers each Sunday. Best ofs work really well and they needed more of these types of promotions on their calendar 19 counties in their footprints – huge market area. lots of boutiques - SMBs Needed something for holidays to tap into these retailers Gift Guide published in early Nov that goes along with it Editorial around Shopping, Entertaining, Events, Parties, Decorating, Recipes
- Voting Categories Shopping Local Bargain Hunting Specialty Shopping Holiday Décor Holiday Pampering Holiday Entertaining 39 subcategories For Voters To Tell Us Who’s The BEST
- In Print and on roanoke.com – including their blog – lots of homepage promotion – even have a “best of” link in top nav! Facebook and Twitter , Pintrest Lots of Email A2 mentions by news Paid Social Push AND Digital Billboards
- McDonald’s has signed up to be the sponsor again in 2014!
- Chaney
- Julie Two holiday sweepstakes contest templates that can be locally branded and run on your site The only entries that show up are ones from your market Play Anywhere Contest is accessible on your website, Facebook, mobile and tablet
- Julie Two holiday ballot templates as well that can be locally branded and run on your site The only entries that show up are ones from your market Play Anywhere Contest is accessible on your website, Facebook, mobile and tablet
- Chaney Use these templates to give you a guideline For tracking and redemption These all have QR codes Unique IDs
- Go to place for industry insights, case studies, and downloadable playbooks and worksheets
- Promotions University is our newest resource. It is an on-demand training and certification program for our partners to help them be as successful with promotions as possible. We have four courses and certifications available on contest planning and sales, deal sales and admin training for national sports contests. And that is just the beginning, we have more in the pipeline including ballot planning, sweepstakes admin and ecommerce planning. Go to secondstreet.com/university to get more information and to get started.
- Julie
- Start early and plan ahead
- Focus ideas that align with programming or print issues
- Like your holiday gift guides!
- Focus on deals/ballots/contests that…help you prep for holidays, for deals things that ppl enjoy doing or make a good gift
- Sweeps, photo, deals stores, ballots
- Use “stores” & “themes” to diversify your deal lineup – now and throughout the year
- Take advantage of SS-provided tools Logos and collateral available; ads – print and online; how to guide to holiday deals Get in the holiday spirit & refresh your site & email with holiday flair
- Chaney