Hot trends for 2017 holiday marketing
Your golf customers are busy online this holiday season—they’re browsing and gathering, researching, shopping, reviewing, watching, and sharing. You can help influence, guide, and convert these experiences into sales and brand loyal followers. Here’s a few trends to get you started.
Online shopping is where it’s at. If you have an online golf business, this may be one joyful season for you. This year, “More consumers plan to shop online this holiday season than ever before. Half plan to shop online, significantly more than those who plan to visit popular store destinations... More importantly, shoppers anticipate spending more online too. In fact, for the first time this holiday season, consumers plan to spend just as much online as they will in stores.” Deloitte Holiday Survey 2016
Mobile is everything. Make sure your website and landing pages are optimized for mobile devices—this means simple navigation, minimized graphics, and limited clicking or typing for your customers. But, it’s more than an optimized website. It must be a seamless experience across all channels. Consider this—more than 50% of the population open their email on a mobile device, and over 80% of time spent on social media channels occurs on a mobile device. Keep it simple, convenient, and consistent this holiday season (and beyond).
It’s all about the experience: While online holiday shopping will reign this year, shoppers still yearn for the experience they’ll find in store—seeing, touching, smelling, or hearing a product. We can’t provide you with smell-o-vision, there is a solution to capture all of these sensory experiences--good storytelling and imagery. Tap into your prospective customers’ emotions with descriptive content that they can relate to—what it looks like to use your golf product, how it feels to use it, smells that may be associated with the experience of your product, fresh leather, newly cut grass, clubhouse, etc., and sounds related to suing your golf product, like the unique crack of a club.
Get social: Don’t forget your social networks this holiday season! Think engaging and shareable, holiday posts or videos that stand out and encourage your followers to interact with your posts; and valuable content, meaning special discounts and promotions unique to your followers. Include a capture form on your social pages to provide your followers with an option to receive additional content or offers, and build your lead database.
Think video: gone are the days of catalogs and window shopping. Now, more than ever, shoppers are turning to video gift guides in the decision making process. Topical Ideas include:
Top Golf Gifts for 2017
Holiday Gift Ideas for Dad, husband, etc.
Golf Stocking Stuffers
12 Days of Golf Gifts
This idea can be applied to other holidays, too (think Father’s Day) and it doesn’t have to be a big production—check out this example to get an idea of how your golf business can create a unique holiday gift guide: https://youtu.be/Xkv3mWPHKU8 or this one: https://youtu.be/joYSzjrlAX4
Stand out: Let’s be honest, it’s a popularity contest. When looking at swing trainers or golf apps, prospective customers look for the golf product that is most popular, whether that’s placement in search rankings, or the best consumer product review. They both go hand in hand—search engine rankings are significantly influenced by authentic product reviews. These reviews matter to your customers; as more than 90 percent of consumers base their purchase decision on peer review. Make sure you’re providing an opportunity for your customers to submit their review/feedback on your product. According to Google, “Last holiday, reading reviews was one of the top three actions shoppers took while shopping on mobile, up significantly from the previous two years.”
From us, to you: Did you know that the cost for attracting a new customer is five to seven times more than retaining a current customer? Consider a short, holiday-specific video geared towards your current customers that thanks them for their business, and provide an exclusive special offer. Not only will this make them feel special (aww!), these repeat customers are likely to spend nearly 70 percent more.
Solid call to action: Holiday marketing is more than just spreading good cheer—you’ve got customers to convert and sales to make. Make sure you’re including a clear next step that you’d like your customers to take that makes sense—whether it’s clicking, connecting, or sharing. This video from the PGA is a great example: https://youtu.be/2thC_7fFBus
Gift Cards: It’s the go-to for all those last-minute shoppers. When all else fails, go with the gift card. Last year, more than 73% of Americans did. In addition to marketing your golf product, consider offering a gift card option that allows purchasers to easily share the love this season.
Self-gifting: Your customers have worked hard to find the perfect gift (your golf product, of course) this holiday season. Make sure they don’t forget—themselves. According to a 2015 holiday shopping report by Facebook, more than half of individuals surveyed said they purchased holiday gifts for themselves, with the majority of high income (1.36x) and mobile shoppers (63%) engaging in holiday self-gifting. This is an opportunity for your golf business to upsell purchases by reminding your customers that they deserve some holiday love, too.
The holidays will be here before you know it! Talk with a Marketing Specialist at Golf Pulp and get started on your seasonal marketing today!
