If you have a seasonal business, your business operations are tied to the cycles that your business goes through in a year. But that doesn’t mean that your marketing matches the same seasonal schedule. When it comes to your marketing, consistency is key. Let’s talk specifically about social media and some of the tips to remember for seasonal businesses.
First of all, does consistency really apply? Even to seasonal businesses?
The answer is yes. Your audience has a million things to think about. Your audience is not focused on your business, and the majority of the people who you are trying to reach in the high season are not actively keeping you top of mind when you go quiet.
The majority of the people who you are trying to reach in the high season are not actively keeping you top of mind when you go quiet. #business #smallbusiness #smallbiz #smb #seasonal
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Marketing is about building trust and momentum with your audience. Halting your communications with your audience means breaking the momentum of your message. When you stop connecting with your audience in low season, your warm leads begin to grow cold. Then, when it’s time to drive attention back to your business as you get back in season, you will be faced with the prospect of having to warm up an ice cold audience.
It doesn’t make sense to have to warm up an ice cold audience every year.
Even if your business operations are seasonal, you don’t want your audience to forget about you. Let’s talk about some things you can do on social media to keep the line of communication open.
It doesn’t make sense to have to warm up an ice cold audience every year. #business #smallbusiness #smallbiz #smb #entrepreneur #seasonalbusiness
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Strategize for the Big Picture
It might be hard to get the energy to market on social media if you can’t think of what to say to your audience while you are in the off season. You can solve this problem by mapping out the big picture of your editorial calendar for the full year. You don’t have to dive into individual posts yet. Ask yourself what kinds of content would make sense for you at different times of year. And ask yourself what types of content would make sense all year so that you can use it steadily to tie it all together.
The key tip for seasonal business is to come up with the buckets of posts you would use at various points in the calendar and put those buckets into a weekly or monthly schedule. If you spend a day doing this, you won’t need to spend time asking yourself what to write for the rest of the year. For some thoughts on ways to approach this, read this series on selling without selling.
Take Advantage of the On-Ramp
Year-round businesses may have a marketing disadvantage. They are so focused on a constant sales cycle that they may forget that they need an actual on-ramp for their campaigns. Your audience will fatigue if you are always selling, and yet businesses that don’t have seasons will naturally tend to sell all the time. Just because they can.
Use this strength to your advantage. In the months that you aren’t actively selling or delivering your products and services, take the time to get your audience EXCITED! Show them all the great things about what you do, how you make what you make, the benefits to your audience, and any other enticing background details. This is likely to land even better in the off season, because there is no pressure for sales and your audience knows it. Get your leads thinking about your offerings so that they are ready to buy once you’re back in season.
Help the Audience Connect to Who You Are
When you are de-emphasizing your sales messages – and maybe even de-emphasizing your products or services themselves – this is a great time to focus on who you are. What is your brand and why should the audience connect to it? You probably have competitors. What makes your business different? Or, to put it another way, what makes it different to do business with you?
If you take the time and spend a whole off season showing people why they should love your brand, they will want to support your specific business once your offerings are back in season. Sure, they may have other options. But they’ve had all this time to get to know you.
It can be tempting to go quiet in a low season. Going quiet makes sense operationally as you keep only the essential functions of your business running steadily. Add marketing to the list of essential functions for seasonal businesses!
Add marketing to the list of essential functions for seasonal businesses! #business #smallbusiness #smallbiz #smb #entrepreneur
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You don’t have to lose marketing momentum in the off season. You can plan ahead, you can schedule ahead, and you can stay in touch with the people who are going to mean so much to you once you are ready for the sales to roll in again. For all the seasonal businesses out there, let these social media tips be a simple guide to motivate you.
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