Q4 2013 Ecommerce Strategy: Q4 Social Strategy
65% of Shoppers use social media to find holiday presents. How are you leveraging your social channels for the holiday season?
Social commerce can be difficult to track and quantify, but its revenue and traffic are no joke. Your social strategy for your online store during and prior to Q4 is big. Here are some ways to get more out of your social campaigns this holiday season.
Q4 Social Strategy
Regardless of the social ecommerce campaign, there are shared elements every social channel should include.
Social Planning: You likely have a marketing calendar for the Q4 holiday designed for content and other marketing endeavors. Mimic that holiday calendar format for your social campaign and designate what social content you will run, when, and on which social channels. Cyber Monday 2012 was the highest traffic day for the year. Make sure your calendar is poised to get the most out of high traffic holiday days. See some suggestions for types of social content below.
Remember your social campaign should flow seamlessly with all of your other marketing campaigns, and work together to push traffic and sales. Utilize email marketing, paid ads, search traffic, content, and similar marketing outlets to augment and compliment social campaigns.
Social Channel Audit: Before you start pushing content, promotions and product on your social channels take a look to make sure that all of your social information is correct, up to date and relevant to your audience.
Social Analytics: Analytics should always be your first stop. Get in-depth information about last years social conversions, and use it to help outline this years social holiday calendar. Get an idea of which products convert well, year round and during Q4 to promote across your social channels during Q4.
Social Audience: Remember that each social channels has different types of audiences. Tailor your social campaigns to the type of visitor that visits each site, and space campaigns out throughout the season to mix it up.
You’ll also want to track mentions, followers and similar social metrics weekly throughout the holiday season to make sure you are meeting your ROI goals.
Social Budget: Black Friday, Cyber Monday, the week of Christmas, and the holiday season overall see a lot of ecommerce traffic. Many shoppers use social as a sounding board or source for gift ideas, so be prepared to spend more during Q4 on your social campaigns. Plan ahead to anticipate higher social spend. Remember your social budget will also
Social Website Integration: For all of your social campaigns, its important that your website experience is fluid and user friendly. Audit your website experience to make sure you are capitalizing on all of yous social traffic.
- Audit website speed, and checkout for social
- Ensure social sharing is easy
- Make sure coupons from social are integrated at checkout
- Create unique landing pages for social deals similar to landing pages for holiday sales on site
- Consider wish list integration for your site
Social Mobile Integration: 55 percent of social networking consumption occurs on a mobile device. Make sure your social campaigns and mobile experience are usable and work together seamlessly.
- Integrate social promotions with mobile
- Audit mobile checkout
- Make social sharing via mobile easy
- Consider using QR codes for mobile devices
Consumers are expected to redeem 10 billion mobile coupons this year, a 50% leap from 2012.
Facebook Holiday Strategy
Facebook is the major social channel ecommerce merchants utilize to engage customers and encourage online purchases. According to HubSpot, 81% of retailers use Facebook to alert shoppers about their in-store holiday deals. Here are some tips to help you get higher conversions and visibility using Facebook this holiday season.
- Create holiday themed cover photos (size:8851 x315), and profile photos. Use your design team to create cover photos and promotion imagery which celebrates the holiday season. To get a holiday feel, consider using your company logo with a bow, present, or gingerbread man, etc.For a more personal touch, include festive employee photos for your cover photo. Use santa hats, elf costumes, reindeer horns, etc to give that fun but human touch.
Online shoppers browse a lot during the holiday season. Change up your facebook visuals to highlight different promotions, sales, gift ideas and contests to get users to return to your Facebook page more.
- Consider running holiday themed contests on your business timeline to increase fan engagement during the holiday season.
- Think about using services which integrate with Facebook to help plan your social strategy like Post Planner.
- Run Facebook competitions which encourage fans to like and share posts or pages.
- Share holiday related tricks, tips, images or fun facts daily to stay top of mind and engage your fans
- Give fans a special opportunity to win prizes, coupons,etc throughout the holiday season
- Ask your Facebook followers simple holiday questions. Remember people love giving advice!
- Encourage your fans to share nostalgic holiday thoughts or pictures
- Feature a charity or support a toy drive, etc and publish it on your Facebook page
- Suggest holiday gift ideas, DIY projects, dishes, etc on your page
- Consider holiday themed videos
- Share holiday photos of your team, office, or store
Twitter Holiday Strategy
Twitter may have a slightly different audience than Facebook, but there are a lot of Twitter users, and they do engage with brands. Below are some insider tips to get more out of your Twitter account for the holiday.
- Update you twitter profile and banner photo for the holiday
- Use a special hashtag for your site, and engage your followers in a conversation on Twitter
- Use popular hashtags like #blackfriday, #thanksgiving and #cybermonday to start and engage in Twitter conversations. Remember Twitter users are using this tag to identify good deals and holiday sales news.
For Q4 2012, the hashtag #cybermonday generated the most traffic for holiday related tweets on Twitter:
- Tweet sales, coupons, deals, one day sales, etc for your Twitter followers throughout the holiday season and during high traffic sales days.
- Run sales or promotions specific to twitter, and share special deals with your Twitter followers
- Tweet holiday images of your store, office, team, event, or anything which relates to your brand and or the holiday
- Be aware of Twitter’s promotion guidelines
- Be sure to track mentions
- Encourage people to tweet you with tips, hints, pictures, etc for the holiday
Youtube Strategy
Video is right on the heels of mobile, and gets a considerable amount of user engagment. Consider the popularity of sites like Snapchat, Instagram and vine with video sharing. You may not want to spend as much time on video, but carve out some time to create and share holiday video content. Here are some quick tips to help you create better holiday videos.
- Remember you can share all of your holiday videos on Youtube as well as all of the other social channels
- Film holiday videos relevant to your industry. Consider DIY, recipes, fun facts,etc.
- Encourage users to vote on best videos, share videos, and comment
- Feature hidden sale codes on videos
- Consider gamification for you videos (and social content as a whole)
Instagram & Pinterest Strategy
Instagram and Pinterest can be difficult to translate to conversions, but they are places social visitors are going, and can facilitate both sales and brand perception. To get more out of your Instagram and Pinterest accounts, consider the tips below.
- Create holiday themed boards, or boards specific to holiday events, promotions,etc. which feature holiday products
- Feature a hashtag contest
- Share pictures, vidoes, and content frequently to stay top of mind for customers
- Avoid being overly sell-y, and focus on user utility
- Feature a holiday contest, but remember to post rules clealy(Pinterest Brand Guidelines).
Whatever social campaigns you leverage this Q4, if nothing else remember to:
- Focus on your social user
- Track everything
- Remember to integrate social with other marketing campaigns
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