How to use Halloween to market your business

Seasonal events like Halloween present new opportunities to market your business and reach out to potential new customers. So, before the big day arrives later this month, we’ve rounded up some of the best ways to use Halloween to market your business.

Run a competition or giveaway

Competitions and giveaways on social media can increase engagement, brand awareness and boost your follower numbers, and what better time to start than Halloween?

It’s up to you how you choose to run your competition – you could offer a limited-edition Halloween product like 2 Dishing Divas (below) or even create a hamper of spooky treats that are suitable for the whole family so that you can target ‘mummy bloggers’ and influencers.

In fact, Branding Beat has rounded up 100 inexpensive promotional items you could buy for your contest, including colour-changing pencils, plastic spiders and pumpkin stress balls, showing that your prizes don’t need to be expensive to be effective.

Facebook is commonly considered the best place to run a competition, as shares, comments and likes can quickly help your post “blow up” and have the chance to go rival, but you could consider experimenting on Twitter or Instagram if you want to grow those channels.

Whenever you offer a freebie in exchange for a like or share, you’re essentially making your customers and followers do your marketing for you.

Having your brand and products show up on their timelines and profile pages is valuable, so invest in quality graphic design or use these free Halloween PSD files to create your own attractive competition images.

Oh, and be sure to follow up as soon as your contest is over.

Whether you ask followers to sign up to your mailing list, follow your profile or just stay in touch, your competition can be a powerful networking tool. Use it to your advantage and you’ll soon find new customers.

Create Halloween-inspired content

Depending on your industry and niche, you could create Halloween-inspired content that you can share on social media. Guides and tutorials will prove popular, and although you’ll only drive traffic for a month or two, you’ll be able to reuse and repurpose the content next year when Halloween season returns.

That’s why seasonal marketing is so effective.

Whether your business is related to food, makeup, home interiors, events or childcare, you will be able to create a handy guide that stands out and makes an impression.

If you’re good at graphic design, for example, you could make pumpkin carving patterns. Free downloads and resources not only appeal to visitors, who’ll share your content on social media, but also to bloggers.

The Balance, for example, has over 1,500 pumpkin carving templates on its website – and if they see yours, they could add it and give you a backlink in exchange.

Special offers

Run a limited-time offer, launch a new product line or offer a promo code that’s themed to the Halloween season, promote it on social media and in your email marketing, and you’ll find customers flocking to your website for Halloween-inspired discounts.

The best way to promote your special offers is to create attractive banners and graphics for your homepage and social media platforms – and you don’t need a graphic designer to make something that looks the part.

You can find free resources on websites like Flat Icon and Pexels and then create graphics on Photoshop or a free online tool like Canva.

Check out this post from GG Baby Creations, for example. They’ve taken pictures of their Halloween costumes, added their logo and created a description that includes emoji and hashtags. Do something similar if you want your special offers to go off with a bang.

Live blogging

Hosting or attending a Halloween event this October? Now’s your chance to stand out and show customers why they should follow you and engage with your brand.

Live blogging and tweeting is one of the best ways to increase brand awareness and interaction. Here’s how…

• Get a smartphone: The chances are that you’ve already got a smartphone. Make sure that yours has a good quality camera and that you’re signed into Twitter before the event takes place. You should also check that you have a full battery.
• Choose a hashtag: Select a hashtag that describes the event you’re attending or hosting. You should also remain consistent. The best way to do this is to copy your hashtag so you can paste it into every post you add.
• Tweet all evening: Throughout the event, post tweets (and remember to include your hashtag). Posts with images and videos are even better during live events and allow you to capture the atmosphere for those who couldn’t attend – plus, they’re more likely to be retweeted and liked than those without multimedia.
• Engage with others: Make sure you engage with other attendees both on social media and in person throughout the event. Retweet their posts and introduce yourself and your business – it’s a chance to network and meet new clients.
• Follow-up: After the event, follow up on any engagement on social media. The chances are that, if they were interested in your posts, they’ll be interested in you and your brand. Doing so could help you find new customers, clients or business contacts that you can use to take your business to the next level.

Live blogging may sound stressful, but it’s easy once you get going. Give it a go at your next event, Halloween or otherwise, and you’ll see why it’s an effective marketing technique.

Give it a go at your next event, Halloween or otherwise, and you’ll see why it’s an effective marketing technique.

Loosen up

Regardless of your business or niche, Halloween affords you the opportunity to have some fun and take your business a little less seriously.

There are lots of ways that you can get into the spirit and show that your business is human. You could add a pumpkin to your Twitter username, create a limited-time promotional banner for your Facebook page or film a video of your staff dressing up for their office Halloween party.

Oh, and you should also be sure to get involved in discussions, too – respond to customers who are getting into the Halloween spirit and tweet out GIFs and videos related to the celebrations. It makes a change from the usual promotional content that you publish, and it could help you land new followers.

Wrapping up

The key to marketing your business this Halloween is to try something new. Halloween is a time to let your brand’s metaphorical hair down and have some fun, so don’t be afraid of joining in with the celebrations and show people that there’s a team behind your brand.