How Companies Are Reaching Their Consumers During the Busy Holiday Season
Companies Can Use Holidays to Their Advantage
By: Katie Willis
Have you ever wondered how brands create strategies that help them stand out when selling holiday seasonal products in a highly competitive landscape?
Brands use their social media in different ways such as including hashtags in their posts and advertising consumer usage of their seasonal products, etc.
A good example of a company that reaches out to consumers during holiday seasons is Starbucks. One of Starbucks’ popular seasonal items is the Pumpkin Spice Latte, or otherwise known as the acronym ‘PSL’. Starbucks sells this product during the fall season beginning in September and stops offering the ‘PSL’ once the winter month of December approaches to make room for advertising of their winter holiday flavors. A quote from Investopedia, “since its introduction in 2003, the immensely successful pumpkin spice latte has brought in over $70 million in profits for Starbucks. The PSL also enjoys a popular presence on social media, leading to its further proliferation among the young and the trendy.” Once the Pumpkin Spice Latte is in season, it is continuously trending on social media with the hashtag ‘PSL’ or ‘PSLisback’. The hashtag ‘PSL’ currently has 815,725 public posts on Instagram. Starbucks first takes advantage of the product’s in-season return to the market by generating posts on all of their social media. Then, their consumers will post pictures of them and the product, and sometimes Starbucks will highlight their consumer’s personal pictures on their social media. Looking at their comments on social media, Starbucks will reply to some comments on their posts, making those people feel special. We can also look at how many likes they have on a single picture; they have 323,302 people liking a single post on their first picture of the PSL.
Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte Instagram post
With Easter just passing, what do you think of? Most people think of the marshmallow candy, PEEPS. Looking at Peeps and Company’s Instagram, they have almost posted every single day leading up to Easter. For example, they highlighted their milk chocolate “PEEPSTERS” eggs on Instagram by stating, “Something NEW has just hatched! Milk Chocolate PEEPSTERS Eggs! The same great PEEPSTERS taste, with a new look and even MORE filling! Need we say more? #peepsters #peepsterseggs.” By adding a hashtag, you can get people to see more of your product and also when people are satisfied, they can post a picture and add the hashtag.There are currently 352 public posts on Instagram using the hashtag ‘peepsters’. We know this source of advertising worked because four days after they posted, those types of chocolate eggs sold out!
It is important to keep this in mind, regardless of the industry or product line you are selling, seasonality and holiday marketing can play a major role in increasing sales. Using a hashtag can get your brand more popularity and consumers will notice your brand more. Even when your product is well known, you need to market that specific product while in-season. If you would like to gain further insight on improving your digital marketing, check out our other posts!