It only takes one month of sales during the year to make or break a business. For many, holiday marketing between November and the New Year is one of the largest and most profitable times of the year. And a string of perfectly executed Black Friday, Free Shipping Days and Cyber Monday campaigns can make the difference between a banner year or bankruptcy.

You may be prepping to get stuffed full of holiday eggnog, turkey, and fruitcake, but is your marketing calendar stuffed full of holiday-ready content ideas? Without proper planning, your business’s holiday marketing may be about as effective as a lump of coal. To ensure your businesses hit their revenue targets, you need proven strategies that work across the entire holiday season; whether it’s Black Friday or Christmas or New Year’s Eve, every holiday presents an opportunity to stand out from your competitors and grab some of that holiday traffic.

Put together by content marketing agency Persado, the following infographic can help you drive holiday marketing success. Using data collected from analyzing hundreds of promotional and editorial campaigns in the US for web and email spanning the 2018 holiday shopping season Persado pinpointed words that deliver the most impact in terms of revenue and engagement. Take a look:

The words that matter in holiday marketing campaigns

Holiday gift guide

Gift guides prime the market and draw shoppers into a curated experience. Expand that energy with techniques which conveys a sense of excitement:

• Use superlative language such as “the most sought-after gifts” that promote the guide, the products, and the season.

Black Friday and Cyber Monday holiday marketing campaigns

Consumers are conditioned to look forward to Black Friday as an anticipated event of the shopping season. That excitement results in high performance for campaign messages that emphasize the event of Black Friday.

• Dramatic, unparalleled language is necessary for these days, so don’t hesitate to amp up the message. Promises of “The Best Deals of the Year” and “Our Biggest Black Friday Sale Yet” perform well.

Free shipping

To get the most from free shipping-related language, link it to the event-based, achievement-oriented messages of the season.

• Use words such as “complementary” or “on us” instead of “free” to elevate shipping to special status.

Doorbuster campaigns

These limited-time “get them while we have them” events tap into the shopper’s sense of urgency, so promote the idea that the customer is lucky to get them. Call out the doorbuster status when running one of these campaigns.

FOMO holiday marketing

Urgency is the dominant tone for these FOMO moments. Use specific, pithy language to tell the shopper they can’t put it o any longer. Avoid generic time references such as “Time is ticking” and tell the customer exactly when the deal is done (i.e. “Sale Ends at Midnight”).

Holiday narratives

The words that work for holiday marketing narratives differ from the words that work across the rest of the year for key industries. Here are three season-specific improvements to marketing messages for retail, travel, and technology marketers.

Retail: Luck

Luck is one of the most powerful emotions during the holiday season for retailers. This is not the case at any other time of year when language around Achievement, Anxiety, and Gratitude performs the best for retailers. Use phrases like “you’ve lucked into some of our best deals ever.”

Travel: Curiosity

Curiosity-related language performs best for travel sales during the holidays. Anxiety, Gratitude, and Achievement perform best during the entire year. Phrases such as “you have to see these special holiday deals” perform well for holiday travel marketing.

Technology: Exclusivity

Exclusivity is the top-performing emotion during the holidays for technology marketing campaigns. Use phrases such as “you have first dibs on our best holiday deals.”

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Source: https://www.persado.com/2019/11/the-words-that-matter-in-holiday-marketing-campaigns-infographic/