I really should have written this post in July. Small businesses (or at least newbies) tend to underestimate the ramp-up time you need to get ready for the holiday season, especially if you’re in retail. But let’s assume you’re not in retail and there’s still time to prepare for the fourth quarter. Here’s what you should be doing today.
1. Set up your strategy. This is the big picture: will you be sending holiday themed newsletters and emails for the next six weeks? Sending clients cards and/or gifts? Marking down products or services? Use a holiday-themed approach to social media? You should take advantage of the fact that people are merrier (and more harried) during this season. Play up on the holiday thing to your benefit.
2. Start shopping for client gifts. The longer you wait, the more expensive these get, mainly thanks to last minute shipping fees. If you’re shipping food (cookies, chocolate), you may have to pay a premium to get the food there before it perishes. Look for discount codes for online stores that sell wine gift baskets, flowers, and other goodie gifts. The Entertainment Book has some great discounts that can save your business a bundle, and you may be able to find daily deals for gift sites as well. Pick a handful of your best clients and decide what your budget is. Remember: if they’re great clients, you can certainly afford to shell out $100 for a thank you gift.
3. Order your cards. While you can buy a few boxes of holiday cards at Target, getting custom cards on sites like Vistaprint brand your business better. They’re dirt cheap too. But like #2, the later you order them, the more you pay to ship. And you need time to hand sign each card and label them. Consider ordering enough for next year, although you might get a different design to prevent repetition.
4. Clear out your inventory. In addition to being the holiday season, it’s also the end of the year. What inventory do you want to get rid of before 2012? Plan your sales strategy to sell it out fast. Slap a Christmas sticker on it and market it as a holiday product (even if it’s printer paper).
5. Blog for the season. If you’ve got a company blog, focus on winter and holiday themes. People gravitate toward posts with themes this time of year. Write them now and schedule them for the rest of November and December. Then you won’t have to think about your blog until after the fog of eggnog and New Year’s revelry fades away.
6. Plan your customer love strategy. Sure you should love your customers every day, but put a little extra effort into this season. Consider adding a gift to each customer’s purchase or giving a coupon code via email. Perhaps you offer a free ebook or whitepaper to website visitors.
7. Get charitable. Donating money or toys to a charity in December has multiple benefits. The first is obvious: you help others. But it also gives you a great PR boost, and customers will love you for it. Pick a charity that speaks to your heart so that the effort is genuine. Invite customers to donate and promise to match the final amount yourself.
8. Test out new ideas BEFORE you need them. Christmas isn’t the time to test out a mobile app or new service provider. If it falls flat, you’ve got that many more customers that you’re disappointing. Start planning far out and testing your new technology to ensure it’s ready to go. And if your team needs to use it, make sure they’re fully trained ahead of time.
9. Expand your selling platforms. If you sell through your website, look at Facebook Marketplace as well as Facebook’s many ecommerce apps for your business’ Page, Kindle and Amazon as new channels to sell your products.
10. Make a list for next year. By the time you get through this list, you’re probably realizing a lot of things you should have done earlier in the year. Put them on your calendar and aim to start earlier next year!