Christmas Marketing- 10 Types of Designs For The Holiday Season
While the rest of the world is busy picking Christmas trees, business owners are busy finalizing their Christmas campaigns. Welcome to the busiest shopping season of the year! Come December, there is a lot of excitement among marketing teams. Analyzing market data, eyeing competitor campaigns, looking back at the ROI of previous Christmas marketing campaigns – there’s a lot of catching up to do.
You might have brilliant campaigns planned. But what does it take to get it out there in front of all the right people? Your designs speak for you. And that’s exactly what we are going to talk about in this blog – designs that you need to carry. After all, for your customers to understand what your campaign is all about and actually interact with your brand, you need good designs.
Why is Christmas marketing important?
Christmas comes every year – so is it really important to revamp your marketing designs for this one occasion? Without a doubt. You are communicating with customers who start months ahead – buying gifts and planning the little details for this occasion. So, getting your brand all dressed up for Christmas only shows customers that you are just like them. In other words, it shows them the human side of your brand.
As a part of preparing for the holiday season, people actively purchase decorations, gifts, food and so much more. With big brands running attractive discounts, consumers come forward and buy items that have been on their wish lists for a really long time.
During other times, you are trying to convince people to spend. But during the holiday season, you are communicating with customers who already have their credit cards out. It’s just a matter of showing them that you are offering the best bang for their buck. That means you can acquire better ROIs with well-planned Christmas marketing.
Ad impressions increase by 50% during the holiday season. And we know the connection between ad impressions and brand awareness as well as brand recognition. This makes the case for taking Christmas marketing more seriously.
For all these reasons, your competitors are also planning more meticulously. Which means your ads have to be attention-grabbers, scroll-stoppers – your voice louder and more convincing. All your designs on social media and print channels should sound the same. Only with persistent and consistent messaging will you be able to persuade consumers to choose your brand during the holiday season.
And here are some branding designs and promotional graphics that you can optimize to carry your Christmas marketing forward.
Christmas marketing – designs that deliver the Christmas cheer
1. Web banner ads
Digital ad expenses from brands have been on the rise. It is projected that global digital ad spending will reach 526 billion U.S. dollars by the year 2024. And times like Christmas are great to keep up with such trends. So, if you don’t know where to spend your Christmas marketing budget, begin with digital ads.
From generating more sales to helping more people discover your brand, digital display ads have a lot of benefits to offer. Banner ads, video ads, interstitial ads – your options are plenty.
The screen real estate available varies with the type of ad and positioning. But ensure that the color palette makes it easy for customers to grasp the Christmas theme in one glance.
Here is an example. Large-sized text to grab attention, a relatable color palette – this design has it all.
2. Social media ads
Paid advertising has its own perks but limiting yourself to web ads means facing the hurdle of ad blockers. So, you need social media ads to back up your digital display ad strategy. About 33% of the total digital ad spending in the year 2022 was on social media advertising.
Moreover, customers tend to browse social media a lot during the holiday season – for their shopping inspiration, vacation planning, and other tasks. Hence, social media would be a good place to meet your customers.
KIMP Tip: While designing ads for social media, be sure to explore different formats like single-image ads, carousels and videos. Considering the tight competition around Christmas, you need ads that stand out. Your ad should convey the message instantly and convince customers to click the CTA button.
If you start early, you always have the option to do A/B testing to find out the most effective ad format for your brand. And a KIMP Graphics + Video subscription will help you get those designs ready on time.
3. Social media design
If customers visiting your social media page from a social media ad they saw find no cohesive content on your page, they feel confused and might leave without taking a step. You don’t want that to happen. So, when you create ads for your Christmas campaigns, ensure that you incorporate a similar visual style and create a set of social media posts to go with them. You can also add the same CTA so that your leads are all streamlined through the same path.
As you can see in the above example, to make your social media posts Christmas-ready, you do not need complicated designs. Christmas symbols and colors are enough to get you started. And by simply placing the product in a gift box, the above post helps customers visualize the product as an ideal gift. This rings a bell with someone hunting for gifts and looking for inspiration on social media.
Another idea is to leverage Christmas symbolism effectively. Make a list of all things that feel like Christmas – to you and to your customers. Use these to create a simple social media post. Like the one that KitKat posted below.
Time to break out those Christmas jumpers! 🍫🎅 🎄 🎁 pic.twitter.com/XADKs5yOv9
— KITKAT (@KITKAT) December 19, 2022
KIMP Tip: Remember that during the holiday season, there is a 26% increase in the number of posts on Facebook alone. Other social media platforms also see this spike in content volume. This means that your post should work harder to earn the attention of your audience. Knowing this, take your holiday social media strategies seriously.
And if you find it challenging to constantly come up with creative designs for your ads, and social media posts, then a creative team like KIMP can help.
4. Web sliders
While the rest of your digital and offline assets get a Christmas makeover, your website cannot be left out. In fact, that’s your virtual store, your brand’s face that most customers get introduced to. So, you need to come up with ways to make subtle but visible changes to your website interface. When there’s some big sale brewing your website should convey it.
Web sliders, for example, can be used to tell your customers that there is a Christmas campaign for them to look forward to.
The above slider tells customers that the curated holiday list of books is ready. A touch of red reflects the festival mood. Similarly, you can swap your sliders for different seasonal campaigns. And this can instantly change the look of your website. Definitely an idea to add to your Christmas marketing to-do list.
5. Email designs
People looking for ways to simplify their Christmas shopping and deals that help them save money will be more willing to open marketing emails. So, Christmas is a good time to put email marketing to good use.
Your Christmas newsletter can be about anything. It can talk about upcoming deals, or capture customer reviews, wish customers on the special occasion, or provide them with a convenient shopping guide. The idea can be anything relevant to your brand and your campaign goals but the design should be festive and on-brand.
Adding evident Christmas elements like Santa Claus, reindeer, and Christmas trees can instantly convey the theme and let customers know that it’s a mail they might find useful during the holiday season.
6. Gift cards
56% of customers prefer receiving gift cards to other gifts. After all, with gift cards, you give the receiver the freedom to choose a gift they like. Choosing between digital and physical gift cards is totally up to you. But a Christmas-themed gift card is a must-have these days.
The purpose remains the same. The value of the gift card remains the same. But, a Christmas makeover makes the card a little extra special. Because this way customers will not feel guilty that they are buying something generic for their loved ones. The personalized festive touch will do the trick.
Adopting the same visual style for both your physical and digital gift cards will be even better. And that’s easy when you work with a team like KIMP that can handle both digital and print designs.
7. Direct mail marketing – postcards
We have been talking about digital designs so far. But for your Christmas marketing to feel complete, you also need festival-ready print designs. A hybrid model incorporating both online and offline advertising will fetch you the best results. And one of the most crucial and effective print assets that help during Christmas is business postcards.
Gone are the days when mailboxes were flooded with Christmas wishes. These days this happens in email inboxes. So, if your brand takes a different approach and sends out personalized postcards to customers, you are sure to win their hearts.
Christmas postcards as they are, or with an exclusive coupon code, make wonderful marketing materials for your brand.
A business postcard makes even better sense if you have planned a special Christmas event. These can promote your event and also provide your customers all the essential information to tell them why they should take part in the event.
8. Packaging design
You can give your packaging design a Christmas makeover either by introducing a limited edition product or simply by adding festival touches to your existing products.
If it’s within your budget, introducing a Christmas edition helps you gain more visibility for a product line. Or if there is a profitable product line, you can boost the sales there. Many popular brands follow this strategy.
For example, KitKat had a Santa Claus edition.
And Pepsi Japan introduced a cake-flavored cola called Christmas Cola. People getting ready for their Christmas parties will definitely be curious to try such unique new products.
The other option will be to just switch the packaging without making significant changes to your product. This will cost lower but still make a strong impact. And it works for brands where customers are sentimentally too attached with the product and will not appreciate any change to it. Like Coca-Cola, for example.
Coca-Cola introduced a Christmas collection where it left the soda and the core packaging untouched but altered the label.
The idea was simple, the packaging label could easily be unwrapped to create a bow. Coca-Cola’s brand color, red, aligns with Christmas. And Santa Claus is an unofficial brand ambassador of Coca Cola as most people know. So, without changing too much the brand creatively modified its packaging and won many hearts. Measures like these take minimum effort, and a small budget but bring maximum returns.
9. Flyers and brochures
Flyers and brochures are indispensable assets in print marketing. And they come in handy, particularly during a busy season like Christmas. If you have a huge sale coming up and you want to highlight big discounts on several products then a flyer can do this. An aesthetic flyer design can also be an elegant sample of the quality and experience your brand offers. In short, flyers can be used both for branding and marketing during Christmas.
The different font sizes and font colors in the above design segregate the text into meaningful easy-to-read portions.
Besides promoting your campaign, flyers and brochures also come in handy for events where you want to record the RSVP. Take a look at the below brochure for example.
One page can be reserved for customers to fill in their details and give back while the rest can talk about the details of the campaign or the event. Or one page can also form a make-shift gift card that customers can furnish at the store to claim a discount.
In both these cases you are giving customers a reason to preserve the brochure instead of tossing it away. As a result, they remember your brand for longer.
And these ideas let you combine more than one marketing design like booking forms, coupons, entry tickets, and flyers in one design. And thus you can save some of your Christmas marketing budget too.
Want to create print ads that look like your brand’s digital identity? The KIMP team is here to help.
10. Outdoor advertisements
A majority of consumers who discover brands and deals online end up shopping at a physical store. So, if your business has a physical store, offline advertising and local audience targeting are things you cannot take lightly. Billboards are effective tools used even by big brands targeting local audiences.
The global billboard advertising market is projected to grow from $61.67 billion in the year 2021 to $66.80 billion in 2022. There is a steady demand even amidst the rising digital advertising strategies. So, during Christmas in order to attract attention and draw in local customers, you need festival-ready billboard ads.
Remember that you are targeting busy shoppers with long shopping lists. So, keep the copy crisp and get straight to the point. Use merry colors and bold text that quickly tells what the ad is about. Of course, imagery like Santa Claus and other Christmas elements are must-haves. That’s when your ad pops out even amidst other Christmas ads outdoors.
Christmas marketing made simple with KIMP subscriptions
56% of in-store buyers use their smartphones to find out more about the product. Or they might even quickly check reviews and deals. So, delivering your customers an omnichannel shopping experience is not a luxury anymore. But then when you work with different designers for each of these print and digital designs, you end up with a collection of designs all in a different style and mood. That’s one place where you will experience the benefits of an unlimited graphic design subscription like KIMP even more strongly. The same team takes care of all your designs. Hence you can be sure that they all look connected. And they all will work together to represent your brand in the brightest ways during Christmas.
Want to give design subscriptions a shot? Sign up for a free 7-day trial.