Is the Christmas we all know and love just another way for megacorporations to make money?

We’re all adults here, so let’s face facts: Christmas is often more of a marketing ploy than holiday, and consumers are eating it up. Sure it’s a holiday, but it’s a holiday for marketing professionals and overpriced stocking stuffers. 

Think about it!

Sorry kids, the Santa Claus you know and love is just a clever scheme by Coca-Cola to get you to drink bubbly cans of sugar! 

Continuing this “bah humbug” thread, here are some ways your brand can make the most of the holiday season.

• Decorate your brand for Christmas

Color builds anticipation for great deals and makes consumers want to spend more money than they usually do. By buying into the festive season and lighting up your brand a bit, you’re showing your customers that you can be festive, fun and (dare we say it?) merry! Decorate your website with the greens and reds of the season. A little goes a long way.

• ‘Tis the season for holiday email campaigns!

People are more willing to open their promotional emails if they’re feeling festive (and hoping for deals), so now’s the time to show them you’ve got Christmas spirit coming out of your ears! Write fun, eye-catching mailers that really sell the holidays. Incorporate important calendar dates, and maybe even a “12 Days of Savings” campaign that keeps them coming back for each new reveal. This is the time of year when people are most willing to have fun with their pocketbooks, so indulge them with some of the fun stuff you’ve been holding back all year!

• Deck the social media halls 

Play around with your social media platforms and the ads therein. Just like emails, folks are more inspired to click on enticing ads if they’re eye-catching, cheerful, geared toward their browsing history, and filled with savings! Which platform are most of your customers hanging out on? Now is the time of year when they’re more likely to click on an ad that interests them, or might interest a loved one for whom they want to get a gift.

• The 31 Days of Christmas

Time is limited for Christmas shopping, and you can capitalize on that with a countdown clock.  Letting your customers know that their time to buy is short can boost sales. And, while a discount code is great, a discount code with a timer slowly winding down is even better. 

• Time for giving

There’s no better way to celebrate this time for generosity than to run a Christmas giveaway on your website. It encourages traffic, and lets people know you care about your clientele. If your customers know that you aren’t just another Scrooge, they’ll be more willing to buy your products and drop their names into your hat.

• Christmas miracles

Consider donating a portion of your holiday income to a group that helps those in need. We’ve all likely experienced want, and far too many in this world are destitute, despairing or in war-torn regions. Christmas is the time of year to consider the needs of others and uplift our fellow humans. 

Whew! 

All that being said, let’s take a moment to remember that the Grinch doesn’t stay grinchy….

Christmas may be a heavily monetized holiday. It’s definitely the biggest holiday of the year for many businesses around the world. But we’d be remiss if we didn’t point out that it means much more than that to millions of people. 

People do celebrate Christmas by making many purchases, but they do it to express their love for friends and family. They do it because they feel generous, and that desire to give often comes from a place more heartfelt than money. In spite of corporate culture’s desire to make Christmas all about them, people see through the facade and use it to their advantage. 

Giving and getting is a momentary thrill, but the love behind it is eternal and passes from person to person, and generation to generation. Each year, Christmas reminds us that together we are stronger. The family we have and the friendships we share are what unite us as a people. 

The love we share is what gives us purpose.

If, one day, we should wake up to discover that the only true meaning of life is to love one another then, at least once a year, that’s enough. 

Merry Christmas from our La Mesa family to yours.