The Holiday Season: A Marketing Opportunity and A PR Necessity
January 12th, 2012 Filed under: restaurant pr — Public Relations AuthorConsumers spent $407 million on Thanksgiving Day 2010, a 28% increase compared to Thanksgiving Day in 2009, according to ComScore, – and that was just Thanksgiving! The holiday season offers a unique marketing opportunity; one that you can’t afford to miss. Whether you should launch a holiday PR campaign is not the question, the question is: what should the campaign be? What are your stories? What is your focus? Even during rough times, people and businesses spend money during the holidays. The forth quarter offers you a unique opportunity to get the word out about your business, service or product. The holiday season is also a period when the media is looking to run articles and segments on gift giving stories.
Keep in mind that a holiday timed PR push has a number of objectives. To begin with, and the most obvious, it can drive sales and bring in clients or customers. It also offers you an opportunity to further establish your brand for the New Year. Also because this is a time when the media is actively looking for stories, you can gain the credibility and validation that comes from being feature in the news.
When launching a media relations campaign during this time frame, remember to target and focus your pitch so that it fits into the holiday theme. Keep the various media lead times in mind. The monthly magazines generally work on a three to four month lead time. You can sneak some stories in after those dates, but pitch well ahead to be safe. The shorter lead media outlets (weekly magazines, newspapers, TV and radio) start gathering their holiday gift guide information in October and early November. With the shorter lead media, you also have a shot at landing a story up to a week or two before the actual holiday.
If you’re starting your campaign in October or November focus on short lead media. Print publications often develop holiday gift guide sections and TV and radio will generally run segments on holiday gifts, holiday food, dining, clothing… you name it. Since you’re targeting the sort lead media, your primary focus is going to be local when it comes to print, although don’t ignore the weekly news publications, or, if your story fits, such outlets as the Wall Street Journal and USA Today.
And don’t ignore the online media. There are blogs devoted to just about every topic imaginable. Find ones that target your field and pitch them story ideas; if appropriate, offer holiday giveaways. Just about every publication has its online counterpart, so pitch their online outlets stories. In this case if you didn’t pitch the long lead media in time, you have an opportunity to garner coverage on their online publication. Also, use this time to share your holiday message via your own blog and social media including Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.
The bottom line is that there is no better time to get the word out about you, your business, your product or your service. Although all holidays offer unique media opportunities, keep in mind that the time period from Halloween to New Year is one that you can’t ignore. It is a definite marketing must.
In my next article I’ll review how to pitch your holiday story ideas.
Copyright © Anthony Mora 2011
