How to Survive Thanksgiving Madness - Inbound Marketing Highlights

11/19/2017 5 min read Written by Lynton

In a special holiday edition of Inbound Marketing Highlights, we prepare for the madness that is Thanksgiving weekend. As the biggest shopping weekend of the year, you'll want to make sure consumers are finding your brand and converting into sales. There are many things to consider as you put the finishing touches on your marketing strategy. Are your Black Friday ads in place? Did you wish your leads a Happy Thanksgiving? Is your website optimized for Cyber Monday traffic? On top of all this, you also have the stress of hosting or attending Thanksgiving dinner. Read below for tips on paid promotion, effective emails, and what to do if you overeat.  

Thanksgiving Madness

Hungry for conversions?

10 paid media tips to drive users from intent to conversion for Black Friday

While driving awareness of your brand is important, it's not the end goal on Black Friday. This Friday, the primary goal is to make sales; and one way to do that is through paid media. This article lists 10 effective ways to use paid media during this holiday weekend. Below I summed up the three I found most valuable.

  1. Extend Your black Friday period- Brands are starting their Black Friday deals earlier than ever now, with some running sales this entire week. Starting early can give you an edge against competitors and reward you with an increased ROI.
  2. Use the Google Display network- Remarketing to previous customers via cross-selling campaigns was a very effective strategy for brands last year. It can be beneficial to begin ads two days prior to Black Friday in order to increase your visibility, driving a higher click-through rate.
  3. Handle Budget Flexibility - Make sure have an additional budget available, just in case demand is higher than expected. This way, you can benefit from an uplift in conversions at crucial moments.

Read the article for the 7 other tips!

Also see: 3 Perfect Occasions to Introduce Paid Media into Your Inbound Marketing Efforts

Email Tips You'll Want to Gobble Up

Black Friday email tips: Brands must focus on emotions, not just deals

Consumers are receiving 55% more Black Friday emails than they did in 2015. With all of these messages, how can your email stand out? Well, one way is by appealing to the consumer's emotions. According to a study conducted by the AI marketing firm, Persado, there are 5 emotions that consumers engage in over the Black Friday period. Challenge, Intimacy, Encouragement, Guilt, and Fascination.

The study tested 171 subject lines which were sent to 65 million contacts in order to see which performed best. Despite being the most-used emotion across Black Friday, urgency language (“Hurry” or “Time’s running out”) did not perform the best. While it might be a  natural emotion to invoke during such a peak shopping period, using one of the 5 emotions listed above can increase engagement and help your brand stand out. The article has subject line examples for each of these emotions as well as content advice.

See also: 3 Email Tools I Can't Live Without

In Case You Over-Eat:

Stove Top Made Stretchy Thanksgiving Dinner Pants, and a Loony Ad for Them

In a hilarious video ad, stuffing brand 'Stove Top' promotes their new expandable thanksgiving pants. With the tagline, "wear the stuff Thanksgiving is made of," this infomercial appears to be a parody. The product, however is real, and was available for purchase at online. Since being released this week, Stove Top has already run out of inventory according to their website.

"UNFORTUNATELY, THERE ARE NO LEFTOVERS. LIMITED-EDITION, HIGH-FASHION STOVE TOP THANKSGIVING DINNER PANTS ARE ALL SOLD OUT."

But in true inbound fashion they offer you a free copy of their holiday card, which is still available for download.

For the Black Friday Bargain Hunters:

Bing Releases Shopping Search Tool With Black Friday Deals Section

Search engine, Bing, is making Black Friday shopping easier than ever with their new shopping tool. Instead of looking for deals on multiple websites, you can now see everything in one stop. Their Black Friday section allows customers to filter the products they want to see and compare prices across several vendors. There will also be a separate section of Black Friday ads running across the platform with major retailers such as Amazon, Best Buy, Macy's, Target, and more participating. With the increasing number of consumers making online purchases, Bing has increased the number of delivery services and package tracking it supports. You can now track USPS, UPS, FedEx, along with other international shipping providers, simply by typing your tracking number into their search engine. This Black Friday is estimated to bring in over $14 billion in revenue- now that's a pie we all want a piece of this weekend. 

Save Room for Dessert? 

This Transparent Pumpkin Pie is Clearly Delicious

This Chicago restaurant is capturing national attention with their 'transparent pumpkin pie'. Featuring many of the traditional pumpkin pie ingredients, this clear pie is placed through a rotary evaporator and blended with a gelatin mix in order to get a clear appearance. Although it looks like jello, it's supposed to have the custardy, melt-away texture of the traditional dish. According to the chef, it's the exact same flavor of the classic pumpkin pie you already love (although some Twitter users beg to differ).  

I wish all of you luck in your marketing endeavors and hope you have a restful holiday with your family. Until next Sunday!

 

By: Lynton

Lynton is a HubSpot Elite Partner that provides certified knowledge and tools to grow your business through integrated inbound marketing, including lead generation strategies, website designs and development, and CRM integrations.

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