Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Cyber Monday: what do all of these days have in common?
They are an amazing time for small and online businesses to capitalize on the millions of advertising dollars being spent by corporations for their own gains. Today marks the end of the hyper-promoted ‘first weekend of holiday shopping’, but if you haven’t yet jumped on the wagon, you still have time to learn from the pros and leverage these national promotions for your own business.
If your company is able to provide a Cyber Monday deal today, for any product or service, consider the impact of a small percentage of this traffic heading your way:
- 1. The #2 most-searched term on Google today is ‘cyber monday deals 2011’
- 2. The #9 most-searched term is ‘cybermonday deals’
- 3. The highest-trending topic on Twitter today is ‘#CyberMonday
If you can work these phrases into your online marketing efforts at the same time that corporations and the media are pushing shoppers to search for them, you will be in great shape. But if you haven’t yet incorporated them into the copy on your website or blog, you are probably too late to catch that site traffic for this season, since your copy would need to be indexed by the search engines in order for it to appear, and that takes time. You can, however, still take advantage of the #CyberMonday topics on Twitter, as well as with timely Facebook and Google+ posts and/or an email blast to your customers this afternoon.
Even if you missed the boat completely on Cyber Monday deals for 2011, you still have time to capitalize on the holiday marketing efforts of the major players and the media. The key is to jump onto the trends that advertisers are pushing consumers to search for. Pay close attention to the buzz words used in holiday ads, and the timing of special sales and events. Buzz phrases like ‘daily deals’, ‘one day offers’, and ‘doorbusters’ could bring a substantial amount of traffic to your site and build your sales base.
Just be sure that when viewers arrive at your website, they are greeted with an amazing offer, a well-designed landing page, and an easy-to-navigation checkout process, or your efforts will have been wasted.