Last minute new year campaigns: marketing ideas for 2019

If you are like many other businesses, the Christmas hype can be somewhat overwhelming. Over the few months before Christmas, you planned your festive campaigns with enthusiasm and created content and collateral for your audience that was truly engaging.

With all the mince pies, pigs in blankets and Brussels Sprouts consumed, you wake up in a daze, worried about what the new year will bring. Brexit, currency drops, financial meltdown and more futile news stories about the Kardashian family fill your mind with a paralysing dread. This feeling can be a cause for businesses to stop in their tracks and forget that January is in fact, a huge opportunity.

We all know that Christmas is a flamboyant, high budget and high impact landmark for any marketing strategy. Make no mistake, there is value in focussing your efforts on perfecting your Christmas campaigns, however, the new year is equally important. For a lot of companies, January is a lull that is seemingly unfaltering. People have spent their money on Christmas presents and new year parties and aren’t prepared to make purchases or use services that aren’t absolutely necessary. This is why you need to push even harder and make sure that even if a prospective customer or client doesn’t make a purchase in January, they are familiar with your company and will consider you as their source for the purchase later on in the year.

In order to do so, you have to raise awareness of your brand and ensure that customers feel comfortable and happy doing business with your company. Take a look at the list below to find out some last-minute tips to make sure that your new year strategy isn’t neglected!

1) Competitions

After the festive period, it becomes slightly more difficult to part people from their hard-earned cash. Therefore, holding competitions that engage your audience and increase brand exposure is a perfect way to start the new year. Think of a prize that appeals to your audience and make sure that the competition is shared on your social media platforms, email and website. Try to use the competition as a way to gain exposure by getting the entrants to share the posts, like your pages/profiles and also, depending on the value of the prize, subscribing to your marketing database (keeping your GDPR compliance in mind of course!)

2) Rebrand

Out with the old and in with the new. Your new year’s resolution should be to update your branding. If you feel that your current branding has become outdated and is in need of a refresh, your customers and prospective clients are likely to feel the same. Although it seems like quite a big job, with the right ideas and a bit of determination, a rebrand can work wonders.

3) Try something new

Although marketing is usually based on a carefully devised analytically driven marketing formula, there is still room for experimentation. Use the new year as an opportunity to introduce your business on a new platform, whether this is social media, email or google search campaigns, try an avenue that you haven’t got around to using yet. It might become the most successful!

4) Attend or host events   

A new year is a brilliant reason to attend and host events. People want to know about the upcoming years’ trends and what they should expect in the future. This is usually a great theme to target a receptive audience that is interested in your business, products or services. Engaging with your audience directly is very important because it builds trust and a sense of personability. If your prospective clients/customers have a positive experience with your company in person, they are far more likely to purchase from you in the future.

5) Promotional deals

If your enquiries and, more importantly, sales tend to decrease in the first couple of months in a new year, a promotional campaign might be the solution. Countless companies jump on the January sale wave without too much thought and strategy. They tend to only discount products that are their least profitable and that aren’t selling well. This isn’t always the best way to attract customers or new clients. Discounting a big-ticket item or service can be a brilliant way to increase your sales and also bring more repeat custom to your business.

If you follow some of these tips, you will give yourself a head start in 2019 and hopefully build the foundations to a successful year.

Best of luck for 2019, have a happy and prosperous year.