The holidays are a fruitful time for businesses.
There are so many eager buyers for a multitude of different products and services – which means you’ve probably been pretty busy lately.
These social media hacks for the holidays will save you some time.
This article will help businesses of all sorts reach new fans and followers, engage current fanbases and help convert them to customers more efficiently.
1. Use less popular hashtags on Twitter
I know this sounds weird, but it works.
Now I’m not saying you should ditch the trending hashtags, but sometimes you want to hit a niche market with some less commonly used hashtags.
Most of the time I’ll get a lot more click-throughs on tweets with less commonly used hashtags than I do with the overused ones.
For example, the Christmas hashtag can get over 70,000 tweets in a week. That’s a lot!
And sure, a lot of people are probably searching for that hashtag, but it makes your chance of being seen also a lot lower because there are so many other tweets.
So I like to use a mixture of most popular hashtags and less popular hashtags.
Whereas if you search something more specific, like #xmasgifts, the tweets per week are much lower – at around 300 per week.
“#xmasgifts” would be a good hashtag for retailers or eCommerce shops to use over the holidays.
You don’t want the hashtags you use to be completely deserted, you just want them to have a niche following.
To search for the popularity of a hashtag you can use a tool like Talkerwalker.com.
Try to find some hashtags related to your business and the holidays that have a maximum of somewhere between 100-1000 tweets per week.
2. Re-schedule your top tweets with Buffer
This is one of my favorite features on Buffer – and it’s super easy to do. I scroll through my top tweets and find the most clicked. You can also search for the most retweeted, most liked, etc.
Here at Wishpond we recently ran a holiday promotion to get $50 off of our Basic Plan (it’s $69 per month on a month-to-month plan).
59 clicks on a tweet is actually really high for us – so this tweet would be a perfect candidate to re-buffer.
I actually find that sometimes my re-buffered tweets will get more than the original tweet – especially if I re-buffer them for a different time of day (7am Pacific Time is ideal for our tweets).
It’s super easy to figure out which of your tweets have been the most popular on Buffer – the thing is, the analytics are only shown for the tweets that you specifically used buffer to schedule.
All you have to do is click the Analytics tab at the top of the dashboard where you’ll automatically be directed to your posts. Then below your Twitter profile image, you’ll see “Most Popular” to the right of “Recent. Just hover over it and choose whichever option you find fitting.
3. Get a little silly with your Facebook posts
So, I’ve been crafting social media posts for a variety of businesses over the past few years.
When the holidays come around that’s when I get excited – I know that this is the time to let loose and have some Facebook Page fun.
So what can you do to spruce up your holiday marketing on Facebook?
There is a lot of different content you can use to jazz up your Facebook page. Here’s a brief list of some types of content you can post:
- Images
- Videos
- Jokes
- Vines
- Quotes
- Questions
- Polls
For example, take a look at one of Charmin’s Facebook posts:
They usually find endearing or hilarious ways to post about their product.
This Facebook post is great because it shows the necessity of their product, but also incorporates the holidays in an adorable way.
Next, take a look at this post by Skittles. They can have pretty obscure posts, but they always relate to their product.
Although this Facebook post may not be as effective for drawing customers into the store, these playful types of posts will help boost the reach of your content.
So, how can you add some hilarity to your own Facebook page? The easiest way is with images.
Thankfully your posts will already be based around a holiday so your posts will already have an extra advantage by being relevant to your fans.
I would start by taking a look at popular sites such as Pinterest or Buzzfeed to get your ideas for funny holiday photos rolling…
Facebook post tip: A lot of successful Christmas posts I’ve used in the past included animals or children… and possibly dad jokes.
4. Change the appearance of a Facebook post and post it again
Re-featuring a post on Facebook is perfect for when you are spreading the word about a certain product, service or promotion around the holidays.
Facebook allows you to customize a lot of how your Facebook posts appear – such as the share image, the headline and subheader and also the description.
This means that you can link to the same offer over and over (but I wouldn’t overdo it).
In this post below, you can see the four different parts of the post you can change:
- The post description
- The link image
- The link headline
- The link subheadline
Make sure you’re not posting the same offer multiple times a day, and make sure that you are providing some different information than the previous post. You don’t want to make your Facebook timeline appear spammy.
Here’s an example of how Sears used this tactic below:
5. Run a holiday promotion to get more Instagram followers
According to Forrester, the top brands on Instagram generate engagement rates 58 times higher than their Facebook posts and 120 times higher than their Twitter posts.
Instagram is the place for brands to be. If your Instagram is in need of more followers, now’s the time to act.
And contests are a great way to generate more followers.
One great thing about Instagram is that it allows you to “follow-gate” your contests, which means you can ask people to follow your brand on Instagram as a condition of entering your contest.
For example, tea supplier Mighty Leaf…
Below you can see that they’ve included it in their conditions:
Note: In Instagram contests like Wishpond’s, there’s an option you can select in the campaign editor so that your Instagram contest only includes entries that follow you.
6. Use Shops to convert Instagram followers to customers
If you already have an engaged following on Instagram, Instagram’s Shops feature is definitely worth a look – especially around the holidays.
Before Shops, Instagram users had no way to shop for the products found on Instagram without specialized tools such as Like2buy.
So how does it work?
Your followers can visit your shop from your Instagram profile or through the feed and Stories. Once they’re at the shop, they can browse products, explore collections, and purchase products.
This happens seamlessly through Instagram’s in-app browser and without leaving the app from shops with checkout.
7. Schedule all of your holiday posts early so you can relax
Sure, the holidays are a great time for making the most out of your social efforts, but that doesn’t mean you have to be on social 24/7.
That’s why social media management tools are so important to your social routine. This may seem like an obvious hack, but it’s one of the most important for the holiday season.
We all need a bit of down time now and then, regardless of if you’re taking a tropical getaway or just spending time with family and friends.
So make sure to schedule your posts (whether that’s with buffer, hootsuite, latergramme, etc.) to take the fuss out of posting during the holidays.
Conclusion
I hope these social media hacks have helped give you some ideas on how to promote your business throughout the holiday season.
What are your most crucial social media strategies for the holidays?
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