For a lot of businesses Christmas can be the biggest and most important time of the year and as a result, their marketing needs to reflect this.

Hopefully, if you’re struggling for ideas, this post will help get the cogs turning but remember, keep it festive and don’t over-think it.

It’s Christmas, not the end of the world!

Tesco: Helping Out

The supermarket giants are always guaranteed to pull out all the stops when it comes to Christmas but unlike Amazon or John Lewis, Tesco focus on the more practical side of the holidays by trying to provide new ideas, hints and tips. 

Everyone knows that coming up with gift ideas for friends and family year after year can be a chore so why not make it easy? Run a campaign in store and online that inspires and helps.

For instance, if I owned a clothing store selling shoes or trainers I would run a “For the Sporty/Messy/Musical One…” that allows me to post a different product for each target customer.

Edeka: All About Family

Another supermarket, this time the German’s Edeka, made headlines with their viral video #heimkommen roughly this time last year. If you haven’t yet, watch it before reading on…

On the one hand this tale of a father faking his own death to see his adult children again is dark and twisted but on the other it’s about family and spending time together and that’s what hit the nail on the head.

The #heimkommen campaign was a massive success on a global scale but the takeaway here for smaller businesses is the festive family theme. Gifts are great but the best bit about the holidays is usually catching up with old friends and family so how can you tie your own products into this message?

If I was selling car tires I would potentially build a campaign with a message revolving around “We can get you home quickly and safely this Christmas”. This would then influence the content I publish on channels like Facebook and Instagram over the next 5 weeks.

HBO: Festival Calendars

The American TV and streaming giant spent Christmas 2015 promoting their “12 Days of HBO Now” campaign that allowed HBO Now subscribers to gift a HBO pilot to friends and family for free.

If you’ve ever watched The Sopranos, Game of Thrones, The Wire, Girls or West Wing you’ll now just how good a gift this could potentially be and I love the calendar aspect.

Late-November and early December are all about the countdown towards Christmas so why not let that feed into your marketing?

Whether you’re a butcher, a sports outlet or any other business the potential is there to start your own “12 Days”, “Advent Calendar” or “3 Weeks to Christmas” campaign both on and offline. 

St George’s Market, Belfast: Keeping it Simple

If you’re still reading and you’re thinking there’s no way my business can compete with or learn from the likes of Tesco, Edeka and HBO then why not take a look at St George’s Market, Belfast? 

The massively popular food and craft market gets better and better every year and their pro-active social media presence only serves to help yet they keep things very simple.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed do something as simple as giving your logo or Facebook cover a Christmas touch-up just to get people thinking about your business and the holiday all in one thought.

Ballymena BID: A Very Beary Christmas

Our last inspirational campaign keeps things local to Northern Ireland with the Ballymena BID’s massively successful Ballymena Bear campaign in 2015. 

Ballymena has long been famed as a great shopping destination in Northern Ireland but the tale of a lost Bear trying to find a friend at Christmas helped showcase the town’s great selection of shops, cafes and shopping centres all in time for the festive period. It was so successful the bear is back for 2016!

The takeaway here is that if Ballymena can do it, you can to!

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Grab that pen and paper and start scribbling and pick up the smartphone and start recording or taking pictures.

There’s still plenty of time before Christmas 2016!