Christmas is an important time for digital retailers. Every merchant that sells something online can take advantage of this wonderful time of year.

Thanks to smartphone users it’s no surprise that e-commerce is the fastest growing retail market in Europe and across the globe. Here, in the UK, online sales in 2017 alone exceeded 230 billion. This is increasing year on year by around 15% as more and more people choose online shopping as their preferred way to shop.

Website visitors and customers love seeing a business get into the Christmassy spirit. However, it is essential that your seasonal branding is engaging, meaningful, and most importantly, in keeping with your branding. Even if you don’t sell from your website, you can still make it look festive! Below are my top 12 tips on how to bring some seasonal pizzazz to your business, just in time for Christmas.

Festive banners and graphics

It has long been the tradition to decorate our Christmas trees to within an inch of their lives, so why not do the same to your website – (maybe just not as extreme, we don’t want to ‘overdo it’ and distract too much away from the design of your site).

Graphic festive banners are an easy way to instantly add some festivity to your website. Try to aim for a warm, cosy or snowy scene settings when choosing your stock imagery. Place your festive banners in the head or top part of your site so it’s one of the first things your visitors will see.

Let it snow

Everyone wishes for a white Christmas, so transform your site into a winter wonderland using snowy plug-ins. Most Content Management Systems such as WordPress, Joomla and Magento offer them and they’re usually free to use. Adding elements such as this to your website or landing page will really set you apart from your competitors. It helps keep your content fresh and shows customers you’re also looking forward to the upcoming festivities!

Make your logo more ‘Christmassy’

Show a bit of personality and restyle your logo to have a Christmassy touch. Adding graphics or icons of a Santa hat or snow are simple, yet effective ways of doing this. If you don’t have the facility or know how to edit your logo simply ask your web designer or site manager. See the example below for Alton Towers, some clever graphic design here, an excellent job well done.

Gift-wrap your promotions

Every product we buy for our loved ones is wrapped for that special touch so why not add to the gift wrapping season with some stylish ribbons on your products and promotions. They can really help draw the user’s eye to your products and service offerings.

Create an Interactive Advent Calendar

Just like when you used to be that excited kid in December, opening numbered doors to reveal a gift inside is a concept that everyone can get behind. This tool is a fun way to entice users with special offers and is a perfect way to engage your users and make them return to your website every day until Christmas. It’s also a great opportunity to increase social media engagement, data capture and drive traffic to your website.

Email Marketing

During the festive season, the volume at which we receive promotional emails increases greatly. Every retailer wants customers to buy from their store so it is therefore extremely important that you have a strong design and message in order to get noticed.

Depending on the industry category you’re in, the dates on which you start your email campaigns will vary, for example:

Charities and not for profit organisation – Christmas is the time for giving and the gesture of goodwill. The month of September is the ideal time to begin your campaign.

Travel and leisure – When planning a holiday most of us tend to start making plans months before going away in order to get the best deals. It would be a good idea to start running your campaigns during the Christmas break as a lot of people are taking time off from work.

Try to avoid email subject lines such as ‘Best Christmas Deals’ or ‘Free Christmas Delivery’, as these are extremely common and will not help you stand out! Having an appealing subject line will make your recipients want to open and read your mail. Playing around with the words or using puns is a good way of accomplishing this.

When designing the email, don’t stray too far from your current branding, as customers still need to relate to who they are receiving the email from. However, it does need to have an identifiable Christmas theme so perhaps using colour pallets such as warm reds and greens, whites and soft blues, will work to achieve a festive feel.

Who doesn’t love an animated GIF! Associated with the festive season they are also a great way of adding a Christmas touch. These could include light up Christmas trees, sleighs, snow, baubles and holly wreaths etc and are sure you light up your email content!

Countdown to Christmas

Let your visitors know exactly how long until Christmas! Adding a countdown to your website gives the exact amount of days, hours, minutes and seconds until midnight Christmas Day. This information has been proven to increases the likelihood that a customer will engage with your website or product by creating a sense of urgency. Countdowns are extremely versatile and can be skinned however you like to fit the theme of your website.

Landing pages

If you run an e-commerce store, landing pages are a great way to draw your customer’s attention on a particular product or special offer. Keep the page informative, with some attractive visual elements that link to your content. Design the pages to have a festive feel and include several CTAs to get your customers into the Christmas spirit, and help increase conversion rates.

Christmas competitions

Competitions promoted on your social pages are a good way of attracting more traffic to your website. To ensure its success, be sure to promote it across all your active social media platforms. Everyone loves an early Christmas present, so make sure you add a prize to the promotion!

Call to Actions

Christmas time allows you to have more fun with the wording of your call to actions. So rather than just ‘Buy Now’ or ‘Add to Basket’, you could use something like ‘Add to your Christmas List’ or ‘Add to Santa’s Sleigh’.

Videos

Statistics show that a high percentage of people want to see more video content from marketers. This might be because it is an extremely effective way of attracting users attention and communicating with them. Video can offer a lot of info in very little time so can be utilised when explaining a process, advertising a product or simply adding a visual element to your website.

Branding your seasonal promo video with festive elements and colours will get your customers in the Christmas spirit and help convert them to make a purchase.

Let us do the hard work for you

Let Design & Online Promotions take care of all your digital Christmas worries! You’ve got enough on your plate thinking about what to get Auntie Pauline for Christmas. Not to mention all of the decorating and shopping to do!

So get in touch and we will help your website make the most of the festive season.