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Everything you need to master your holiday sales

2018 HOLIDAY SE A SON GUIDE FOR MARKE TERS2

The holidays. They come every year, bringing huge retail opportunities

with them. Optimizing these opportunities can be the difference

between realizing millions of dollars in sales, and not. From the team at

MNI Targeted Media Inc., here’s our early gift to you for this holiday season:

6 Marketing Moves That Will Up Your Holiday Sales And Win Brand Loyalists

1. Start Planning NOW

2. Data is the Gift that Keeps on Giving

3. Make Mobile a Priority

4. Spread Cheer and Pay it Forward

5. Breathe Life into Email Campaigns

6. The Power of Magazines!

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“extravagant christmas gifts

twenty gifts under $20

top 12 trending gifts for tween girls

When October rolls around, the last thing retailers want to do is miss out on sales opportunities. This is why we are listing Start Planning Now as the #1 way to ensure that you maximize your holiday revenue.

The most successful retailers for Holiday Season 2018 will build in long lead times for planning and executing their marketing strategies.

When it comes to planning, knowing the overall landscape of shopping trends is a critical step, and can take time. Two of the biggest questions are, ‘Where are my customers finding me?’, and ‘How can I ensure it’s easy for them to do so?’

All eyes will be on online shopping. This year, holiday e-commerce sales are estimated to reach $526 billion, and increase their fraction of total holiday spending.

Still, e-commerce alone doesn’t tell the whole story, and savvy marketers can’t dismiss brick-and-mortar. It’s true that the web has become the go-to place for shoppers to research purchases, but often their research drives them into stores.

Another holiday must-have that requires early planning and plenty of lead-time is

personalization. Trends show that email campaigns and digital marketing are hugely enhanced if they’re personalized and catered to the customer’s specific interest. According to a study by Adlucent, 71% of consumers prefer ads tailored to their interests and shopping experiences, and are almost twice as likely to click-through an unknown brand ad as long as its personalized. (Source: MarketingDive, May 2016.)

In other words, your customers want to hear from you—with the right message, at the right moment. Planning ahead will help you anticipate their needs and meet the right people in the right time/place.

Start Planning NOW

$454.91$526.09

$604.18$690.84

$787.15$891.77

Retail e-commerce sales % change % of total retail sales

U.S. Retail E-commerce Sales, 2017-2022 (Billions)

2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022

Source: eMarketer Holiday Shopping Preview, 2018.

2018 HOLIDAY SE A SON GUIDE FOR MARKE TERS4

Not sure where to start? In formulating your initial strategy, see the bigger picture of how your customers interact with your brand across channels, and then begin to focus on specific tactics for each. “Brands that plan how media works together—recognizing there’s a unique time and place for all touchpoints—consistently come out ahead,” says Klarn DePalma, Executive Vice President of MNI Targeted Media Inc.

Don’t be afraid to dive into creative, even though it’s currently beach weather. The sooner you begin testing and getting feedback on messaging, creative, emails, and more, the sooner you can pivot, revise, edit, and have everything in the best shape for Go Time.

4 Tips to Jumpstart Your Holiday Marketing:

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Sit down and analyze your customer data—and if you don’t have any, get some. How? You can model it out, borrow some, or buy information. (More on that to come.)

Use information about your core customers to determine who you want to target and how. From there, take the time to develop and fine-tune your creative.

Remember that you’re going to version creative for each moment in time that each ad is being seen.

Above all, remember to be authentic, provide value, and speak to your targets directly.

During the holidays, successful brands make sure their products pop up online at just the right moment—like when a parent is on his or her phone searching for that perfect gift for their child. To ensure that your product has high ranking in searches, don’t forget to pay attention to SEO. extra

tip Many keywords are seasonal, so be sure you’re adding holiday-focused terms like “Christmas gift ideas,” and “Winter vacation destinations in Orlando.” If you’re ranking well already for your main keywords, adding holiday-based keywords will bring you a ton of extra free traffic. Remember, SEO takes some time to see results, so start your SEO campaign this summer if possible. In six months you should start to see an impact.

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A recent study by Forrester showed that 78% of marketers believe in the value of using data and analytics to better understand and reach consumers.

Data can hold the key to your brand establishing meaningful connections with your customer base—an essential ingredient to holiday sales success. Remember personalization? Customer data, used the right way, will be your secret weapon for ensuring that you’re targeting the right audience with personalized messages and offers that are relevant to them.

Data strategy takes time, which is generally not something marketers have. So how can you best use what you have and get what you need?

ATTRIBUTION GAME CHANGERS Use your data strategically. Think about where sales are coming from—certain websites? social media?—and make these touchpoints your focus. Leveraging insights from attribution helps brands decide where to invest their marketing dollars.

HOW TO TARGET WITH DATA Use your customer data to target individuals based on intent, and motivate them to buy using a combination of purchase data and online behavioral data, looking for the following factors:

n Where they shop (your store, your competitors, etc.) n How frequently they shop (regularly, less frequently, lapsed, or new) n Where they live (region, state, ZIP code) n What they spend (dollar amount, average basket size, items purchased)

tip 1The consumer journey is fragmented. As such, it’s essential that your brand messaging is visible on the channels your targets are visiting in real time. Tailor your creative to where it is going to be seen, and steer clear of a one-size-fits-all scenario.

Since no one likes seeing the same ad over and over, consider going seasonal and customizing based on the audience. For example, your image of a Christmas stocking could include a gift for sports enthusiasts on one site or channel, and kitchen items for aspiring home chefs on another.

Data is the Gift that Keeps on Giving

tip 2

Source: Better Data Quality Equals Higher Marketing ROI, Forbes, July 2017.

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75% of U.S. social media users prefer to follow in�uencers on Facebook.

92% of advertisers view Instagram as important to their 2018 marketing strategy.

50% of U.S. internet users follow in�uencers on their YouTube channels.

Source: eMarketer 2017.

42% of U.S. in�uencers include Twitter as part of their campaign strategies. 36% of internet users

view blogs as an effective marketing tactic.

26% of female in�uencers view Pinterest as the most important network for their personal brand.14% of social media

users use Snapchat to follow in�uencers.

BE SMART ON SOCIALFor most consumers, social media is a go-to resource for ideas and decision-making on gifting and travel. While Instagram, Snapchat, and Twitter remain heavy hitters, Facebook will likely remain the primary lead generator for holiday sales in 2018. In fact, a Verto Analytics survey of U.S. digital shoppers in 2017 found that Facebook was the app consumers were most likely to consult during a digital shopping session.

To help optimize holiday sales through social, think about socially relevant ways to place your product on each channel in the most efficient and effective way. Personalization and platform-specific content are the names of the game—people curate and cultivate their social media feeds based on their preferences, meaning that they expect ads and/or product posts to be relevant to them.

As such, the timing, strategy, and creative should be tailored to each channel—all social platforms are not all the same. Your customers use each one differently, and they expect different advertising and marketing on each. Tone-deaf or platform-inappropriate marketing will be a waste of your efforts at best, and a turnoff for consumers at worst.

Lego is an example of a brand that has consistently succeeded with creative, fun, and well-timed social media campaigns. Their annual holiday set is released months in advance, and customers are encouraged to post photos of their unique creations with the sets. The brand wins with all ages because it focuses on connecting with both parents and children, encourages and rewards user-generated content, and keeps the content relevant to the platform.

of consumers say they have made fashion, beauty or style-related purchases after seeing something on Instagram (Source: Retail Dive, August 2017).

Source: eMarketer 2017.

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U.S. retail e-commerce sales increased to $455 billion in 2017, the highest rate since 2011.

eMarketer estimates e-commercesales will grow

in 2018.

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e-commerce

Make Mobile a PriorityEvery year sees a rise in the number of holiday consumers tapping into apps while in-store. While their activities vary, the primary actions they’re taking are researching products and comparing pricing.

Both Google and Facebook have been improving local advertising options and online-to-offline measurement, to help retailers take advantage of this trend. Many brands are using geo-targeting to get special offers onto the phones of consumers at the point-of-purchase.

Source: comScore via eMarketerHoliday Shopping Preview, 2018.

2018 HOLIDAY SE A SON GUIDE FOR MARKE TERS8

A strong mobile strategy is all about giving your customers what they want, in the moment they want it—it’s all about instant gratification.

“Understand that customers are being catered to. They expect things to be convenient. They expect a retailer to have a [mobile] presence,” says Barbara Kahn, Professor of Marketing at Wharton Business School, University of Pennsylvania.

To ensure that your mobile strategy succeeds, the #1 rule is Make Purchasing Easy. Brands that have easy-to-navigate apps that enable customers to make purchases whenever and wherever are ahead of the curve.

Also remember that mobile and brick-and-mortar aren’t mutually exclusive. In fact, retail experts say that customers who shop both on mobile and in-store spend more than those who shop on only one or the other. Look for ways to incentivize shoppers to use mobile as a tool that works with your brick-and mortar location. Big retailers areincreasingly offering buy online, pickup in-store orbuy on mobile and ship to store as options,as well as selling mobile-ready gift cards thoseshoppers can redeem in-store.

Above all, don’t try to outsmart your customers—just pay attention to how they’re buying and what would make their lives easier, and build your mobile products from there.

HOW TO NAIL YOUR MOBILE EXPERIENCE (So Customers Don’t Wind-Up with a Lump of Coal)

Mobile is one of the best tools for using first-party and third-party data to learn more about your target audiences. By targeting their phones, a brand can serve consumers relevant ads that will help get them into the store at the moment they’re researching or looking to purchase.

The best way to reach your target audience in the right way, at the right time, is by using data to identify their demographics and shopping behaviors, and serving personalized ads to their phones in key moments.

n Use location grid technology to reach targets in proximity to retailers. Reach target consumers—or your competitors’ audience—as they enter specific stores or locations, and serve them value-driven ads that redirect them to your store.

n Leverage beacon technology to serve ads at the point-of-purchase. Reach your target audience when they are in-store, contemplating purchases.

Word of the Day: BOPUS (Buy Online, Pick Up in-Store)

40% of U.S. shoppers used click-and collectduring the 2017 holiday season. Duringpickup, 90% made additional purchases!Source: International Council of Shopping Centers.

Tip: Mobile and Data: A Match Made in Heaven

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Knowing that a brand is socially conscious influences purchasing decisions, especially when the brand supports a cause that their customers personally believe in.

Cause-related marketing gives brands the opportunity to make a positive social impact and achieve a good image in the eyes of their consumers, which ultimately leads to greater customer loyalty. It’s a win-win!

Brands like Macy’s, Subaru, and Nike are doing it, and customers are responding. For over a decade, Macy’s has been ringing in the holiday season with its annual Believe campaign to benefit The Make-A-Wish Foundation. To take part in the campaign, believers of all ages are invited to drop their letters to Santa into the red letterboxes located in-store, or submit them online.

For each letter received, Macy’s donates $1—up to $1 million—to help grant the wishes of children with life-threatening medical issues.

Another brand winning hearts and minds (and dollars) during the holidays is Subaru. Its holiday ‘Share the Love’ campaign shares heartwarming stories of real people discussing how the ASPCA, The Make-A-Wish-Foundation, Meals on Wheels, and National Park Foundation touched their lives. ‘Share the Love’ traditionally runs through the New Year, with Subaru donating $250 to each customer’s choice of charitable partners for any vehicle sold. According to Jeff Walters, Senior Vice President, sales, for Subaru of America, in 2017—the 10th anniversary of Subaru’s Share the Love campaign—the brand handed out almost $115 million in donations. (Source: Forbes, Subaru is Feeling the Love, Nov 28, 2017.)

The key to success with social impact campaigns is an understanding of how to launch a worthy campaign that makes actual social impact, and to communicate that campaign in a humble, appropriate way. Brands that brag about how generous they are easily alienate their base, particularly with savvy customers who police brands on social media. The key is to promote in the spirit of holiday giving, and to position contributions as a value driven by the consumer, not the brand. This makes consumers feel like their purchase is a way of giving back—especially important to people during the season of giving!

extra tip

In today’s world, it’s not enough for brands to merely sell a product or service. Customers expect brands to take positions on many social and political issues of the day. Millennials and Gen Z shoppers, especially, show a preference for brands that stand for something. The loyalty of these customers increases drastically when a company not only takes a point of view on a social or political issue, but also takes action that brings a tangible, positive impact.

Spread Cheer and Pay it Forward

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Email is often a love-hate relationship for both marketers and customers. There are too many emails flying into inboxes on any given day. But for some shoppers, the holiday mindset shifts into buying mode, and emails about deals become welcome helpers to assist in shopping.

Brands that position their emails as a valuable shopping tool—that exists to help customers—are going to win the holiday email game.

• Test. Test. Test.• Give subscribers access to special deals.• Send a sales preview.• Inform customers of new holiday hours.• Incorporate holiday imagery into

your emails.• Remember all of the holidays

your customers will celebrate.• Don’t just promote. Send out holiday

greetings and tips.

TIPS FOR SUCCESSFUL EMAIL MARKETING IN 2018

On average, retailers increase their email frequency to their subscribers by roughly 50% during November and December, compared to non-holiday months. That’s a lot of extra emails that have to get designed, coded, and tested.

Be sure to start more than two months in advance—you won’t be sorry, given how much revenue is at stake. Remember that sending the emails takes additional production workload during the peak time in the holiday season—so prepare for that as well. And remember to email campaigns across screens and devices before launching. The surest way to lose holiday cheer is to have a campaign that fails to launch.

20% of site visits in 2017 were the result of search (paid or organic). Source: Adobe. eMarketer, U.S. Holiday Shopping Preview, 2018.

Breathe Life into Email Campaigns

Referral Sources:

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Digital is all the rage but here’s the thing: campaigns work even better when combined with print magazines.

Tried and true, magazines deliver neuro and sensory experiences that are excellent ways to get the word out and drive messaging into the homes of purchase influencers. In fact, 64% of magazine readers are inspired to take action after seeing an ad in the magazines they read. And magazines still deliver the highest ROI per dollar of ad spending, beating display ads, TV, and mobile.

The immersive experience of reading a print magazine is as powerful as ever, and as such magazine ads have the influence to impact the brain in a deeper, more lasting way than a digital ad or social media post.

With this in mind, brands should still prioritize and plan for the power of print promotion, as they do with digital. Just as digital needs to be properly targeted and tailored to the desired audience, so does print.

While print takes a bit more pre-planning time- wise, it holds advantages that make it worth the effort. Getting mail is now a novelty for consumers, and mail perceived as a gift still holds weight—which is why so many brands invest in holiday catalogs.

The first step in planning a holiday print promotion is to stick to the basics: determine what you want to say and who you want to reach. If you are going for the DIYer, then consider publications like Martha Stewart Living or Real Simple, and if you want to plant an idea for a health-and-wellness stocking stuffer, O, the Oprah Magazine may be the perfect fit.

When it comes to allocating budget, Cover Wraps are a novel way to push brand messaging to target more eyeballs. These takeovers of a magazine’s cover allow brands to gift wrap a favorite magazine with the brand’s messaging.

The Power of Magazines!

Food & Wine magazine is known for beautiful covers that whet appetites. In 2017, advertisers for the California Milk Processor Board partnered with MNI to create a Food & Milk Cover Wrap takeover to showcase how milk, in addition to wine, could be a pairing to sweet and savory dishes served on holiday tables. The exclusive Food & Milk Cover Wrap was delivered to subscribers of Food & Wine in California during the holiday season.

Another way to use magazines is to place special offers and even samples within the pages. As with digital, the same ground rules apply: develop tailored creative, targeted to consumers who are interested in the product, and reach them at the right moment.

64% of magazine readers are inspired to take action after seeing an ad in the magazines they read.

Source: GfK, MRI, Spring 2016.

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About MNI Targeted Media Inc.From research and strategy to implementation and analysis, MNI Targeted Media Inc. delivers the digital and print products and services needed to efficiently and effectively reach audiences across the country or across the street.

© 2018 MNI Targeted Media Inc.

In your planning, it’s safe to assume that holiday shoppers are spending until the end of December. According to MasterCard, the second-largest weekly growth rate in U.S. e-commerce sales during the 2017 holiday season occurred the week of December 17, when sales increased 23.7%. Only the week of November 5, when retailers were rolling out early deals, had higher year-over-year growth. December 23, which was a Saturday, was the second-highest shopping day of the year. (Source: Holiday Shopping Preview 2018, eMarketer.)

HAPPY HOLIDAYS IN JULY!Interested in learning more? Visit us at mni.com or email holiday@mni.com

There may not be a one-size-fits-all solution to optimizing your holiday marketing in the digital age, but there are still some guidelines that will give you a solid foundation. Start planning early (like now!), organize your data and think strategically about the best way to use it—maybe in your mobile marketing—keep your messaging positive and FOMO-friendly, use email wisely, and don’t forget to harness the power of print. Add all of these to your wish list, and you’ll be ahead of the game when November rolls around!

expert tip

TIE IT WITH A BOW

DON’T FORGET THE LAST-MINUTE SHOPPERS.

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