With the upcoming autumn season, it’s time to start getting our businesses and social media platforms ready for Halloween and October. With 39% of women and 33% of men starting their Halloween shopping in September and 39% of women and 40% of men starting their Halloween shopping in the first two weeks of October (soocial.com), now is the best time to spice up our businesses for the spooky festivities. Not to fret, we at CMM have put together a bunch of ideas to market your business to make this Halloween your most successful so far!
Autumn Sale
A tried and trusted method…an Autumn or Halloween sale! Offer your customers a discount on your goods and services throughout October or even the full Autumn season. This is a perfect way to offload Halloween stock ready to make way for Christmas themed stock or even get your business name out there ready for the holidays. For that extra special touch, use a Halloween or autumn themed discount code such as #spookydiscount or #fallsale.
Promotional Gifts
Similar to the autumn sale, why not try Halloween themed promotional gifts. This is a great way to reward your customers during the fall season to make them feel extra special. Examples could include, sending your customer something pumpkin spiced scented, spooky themed stationary, or even Halloween Candy along with their product or service.
Gift Guide
Have a few products that would make great gifts for the spooky season? Put together a gift guide with those items that suit the season. This would make a great addition to your website to give your customers ideas for the season or as an email blast to go out to all those on your mailing list. Click here for our gift-guide "how to"!
Here is a Christmas Gift Guide example from our amazing client Inky Apparel Creations:
Email Templates
Speaking of mailing lists, use the Halloween season to get extra creative with your email templates. Try using colours associated with the fall season, such as oranges and browns, or for an extra spooky feel, try orange, black and purple colours. You could also change up your fonts to something with a spooky feel, just make sure that the font is still readable and accessible for your customers.
User-Generated Content
Use user-generated content to your advantage. Encourage your followers and customers to participate in the spooky season alongside you. A great way to do this would be to create a halloween themed hashtag that customers could use in photos they post about your product or service. You could even host a competition with a prize going to the best halloween themed photo that has used your hashtag.
Themed Website Pages
Decorate your website with the spirit of Halloween. You could change your photos to create a spooky vibe, add a banner at the top of your website with spooky motifs promoting a sale, discounted service or just to celebrate the season. If you wanted to get really into the season, you could change the theme your website uses to something that offers a spooky flare.
Themed Events
Host Halloween themed events. Holding a webinar or going TikTok or Instagram Live? Then dress up for the occasion in themed fancy dress. You could also host Halloween themed activities throughout the webinar or Live event. Think spooky riddles, telling ghost stories to your viewers or placing something freaky in the background for your viewers to spot.
Video Content
Put together Halloween themed video content. Have some important content to go out to your audience? Make it spooky or autumn themed! Use music and motifs to create that spooky feel. You could also take part in current video trends such as the pumpkin head photo video trend or the ghost photo video trend. This would be a great way to show products while being a part of the community.
Interactive Content
Create Halloween interactive Instagram, Facebook and TikTok posts. You can encourage engagement with quizzes or asking your customers Halloween themed questions. Examples could include creating a ‘Who is Your Spooky Counterpart?’ quiz or asking your customers what their favourite halloween costumes or candy is.
Celebrate National Days
National days are a great inspiration for making content. They can be both relatable and fun, whilst also raising awareness for important charities and causes. Make a list of dates that are relevant to both your business and your audience, and plan a series of content in various formats. Not sure which dates to celebrate during October 2022?
Outsource & Strategy Advice
We understand that sometimes planning for the Halloween and Autumn season can be a little daunting (is that a pun?) but we hope that some of these ideas may get your creative juices flowing ready to create some amazing content for your customers to increase traffic to your site or shop.
Want an extra helping hand with your social media and marketing content this Autumn? We are here to help! We are currently offering our new 1 hour consultation service for just £50 down from £75. Book Now!
About the Author
Carris is our Operations Supervisor and Digital MArketing Assistant at CMM. Carris (alongside her best friend Abbie) is one of the founders of Inky Apparel Creations.