It’s almost here! Summer. It can be frustrating for small business owners as it often comes with a slow down in sales as people just start taking it easy.
While there are no magic solutions, there are things you can do to overcome the summer business slump. Here are 5 tips for getting more from your summer marketing strategy.
#1: Work with what you’ve got
If you had a summer marketing strategy last year, figure out what worked and what didn’t. As yourself questions like:
- How engaged were your customers with your social media campaigns?
- Did you have good follow through and brand recall after events and sponsorship opportunities?
- What was general customer sentiment?
Make sure you’re building metrics into your strategies so you can track your successes. You can recycle strategies and tactics that worked well but find a creative way to keep it fresh for the upcoming summer. And you can avoid the things that just didn’t work.
#2: Try something new
If you didn’t have a summer marketing strategy last year, or perhaps it just didn’t work well overall, or maybe you are just adventurous, you might just want to try something new this year. Summer is a great time to step out of your comfort zone but remember that anything you choose to do should fit with what your audience would want. There is no reason to try something new unless you think it will bring positive results.
#3: Connect with the community
There is so much community activity in the summer you should really focus on building experiences rather than sales tactics. Whether you look at sponsorship opportunities for sports teams or community events, or even creating your own event, find ways to connect on a more personal level to build solid relationships that will continue throughout the rest of the year.
The idea is that you need to focus on brand recall through positive interactions rather than a hard sales technique. Just have fun with your marketing. Your target audience will respond will to it.
#4: Focus “snackable” content
People generally have less time to consume content in the summer, so you have to really grab their attention with quick and easy to digest content. A great way to do that is to focus more on visual content for your digital channels. Think snackable content with lots of images or even video or audio.
You can easily do this by doing things like:
- Posting more images on social media with shorter captions, or even memes with no captions;
- Doing vlogs (video blogs) instead of written blogs;
- Do How To blogs that take you through step by step with images and less words;
- Start a podcast; or
- Create downloadable content so it can be consumed offline (at the cottage!).
#5: Pick a theme for your summer strategy
Get your audience invested in your summer marketing strategy by picking a theme that they can follow. If you pick a theme and tell a story around it using tactics that build on each other throughout the summer, you can create forward momentum even at a time of year that is normally slow.
Summer doesn’t have to be a tough time for your business, you just have to be proactive in creating a summer strategy that makes sense.
Candace Huntly is Founding Partner at SongBird Marketing Communications, an award-winning agency working to take organizational and individual brands to the next level. With a passion for all things related to creativity and strategy, she specializes in business intelligence, marketing & branding, content strategy & development, media & influencer relations, and social media. Basically, if you need to put your brand, product, or cause in the public eye, she will find a way to do it, while making the approach unique to you.
Connect with Candace
Check out our Brand and Business Strategy Package to set you up for business success!
A version of this article was originally posted to the SongBird Marketing Communications blog.
Facebook/Twitter/LinkedIn/email/Website
