Easter is a time for everyone to stock up on groceries, books, fancy lunches and dinners – and take well-deserved breaks. Tasman Page says this time of year is also the perfect opportunity for businesses to learn how to effectively use social media to provide the best information and experiences for consumers during big spending periods.
Easter is here, and this year, the mood is definitely more buoyant than last. With a Covid-19 emergency no longer providing the backdrop to this brief holiday season, people are set to celebrate harder than ever to make up for 2020 — and that means an opportunity for business, too.
Social media is no longer centred around Facebook, which, while still dominant (according to its 2.8 billion self-reported monthly users) is rapidly losing ground to new platforms such as WhatsApp, Instagram and TikTok.
And as younger generations come of age, their buying power is rapidly transforming social platforms once reserved for sharing user content into one of the most effective brand and retail strategies to date.
Below are three ways social media can not only enrich the retail brand, but also the customer experience.
Add value to their weekend
The first rule of any good brand strategy is to clearly define who your customer is, and how you can add value to their lives. Well, Easter (as always) is taking place over the weekend, which provides an ideal opportunity to consider how you can enhance people’s lives in their free time.
Competitions, deals and course-engaging content (road trip playlist anyone?) are some options which can not only help establish new partnerships (such as partnering with a friendly brand) but also generate more impressive results overall for both brands through combined effort.
But it’s not just about brand building: a long weekend is an ideal time to drive sales, with a recent study in the US by the National Retail Foundation finding that 37 per cent of those under 35 years old used their smartphone to make Easter purchases.
For marketers in the B2B space, your customers might not find your messaging relevant right now, which can prevent you from generating cost-effective leads. That said, you do have the added bonus of less competition, so if you can think of a way to add real value over this period, do it.
Select your channels
What you sell where matters, and identifying which channels are likely to be quiet over this period (such as LinkedIn) and which will be pumping is key to selling more efficiently. More ‘fun’ social channels such as Instagram, TikTok, YouTube lend themselves better to times where we are relaxing, so focusing your energy on selling products and services within those is a better use of your time.
Story Ads are also an important part of pretty much every social strategy, but you will need to create content specifically for this ad type. Balance brand visibility with creative cut-through to avoid the skip.
Timing is everything
The time of day is crucial to sales: if you know what your target audience is doing at any time (or likely to be doing), you can align your message to that period.
A recent study by Facebook in the UK showed that 42 percent of the conversation around Easter happens before the day itself as people plan their shopping needs, which means that if your social strategy is planned around the Easter holiday itself, you may already be too late.
That said, it all comes down to how much you understand your customer base. Some advertisers will post during the hours their audience is most likely to see the ad; others post during peak hours when users are most likely to engage, click, or convert.
A word of warning: be careful with dayparting your ad spend – it will limit delivery and often drive up your cost.
