Diwali is the most eagerly-awaited festival in India, which is celebrated with excitement and a great deal of anticipation.
With the festival season round the corner, businesses, brands and companies are gearing up to launch their festive sales, and analyzing marketing strategies that can spike their sales. Holidays and festive seasons are definitely great for business, when consumers have switched on the “buying mindset” and look forward to sales and promotions. Such festivals provide an opportunity to increase profit margins, as against all odds, people prefer to shop during auspicious festivals like Diwali.
After the pandemic hit us, the focus shifted to ‘digital’. With India forging ahead in digitization, eCommerce has redefined Diwali shopping for Indian customers.
The pandemic has severely impacted almost every economy across the world. And, Indian markets are also struggling to make a comeback. While this year’s Diwali profits are likely to be less than last year’s, it is expected that sales may be better than the previous two quarters of 2020. How can small businesses create ideas to increase sales during Diwali? Here are some tips:
• Focus on the target audience
As you design your Diwali sales strategy, keep buyers firmly in mind. Who are the people that are actually buying the most during Diwali? Interestingly, going against the general belief, it is men who buy the most in Diwali shopping, according to a study by SEMrush; and, it is revealed that over 50% of Diwali shoppers are between the ages of 25 and 34.
The same study shows what people spend on during Diwali, eCommerce tops the chart with 22 percent followed by travel (18 percent) and home items (14 percent). This information is useful in choosing which products to feature in ads and social media campaigns – any product or service related to gifting, travel or home.
• Personalize your offers
Email marketing is the most effective holiday marketing channel for at least 60 percent of businesses. Keep your email list for the holiday sales. You can divide your customer list into groups with similar interests and characteristics. By doing this, you can better tailor your message to each group. This way, you’ll get much better response rates. You can divide your customers into groups. Segregating them via demographics will give you information about your buyers’ gender or age and you can carefully tailor the offer for each group to boost sales. Observing the geographical location, you can create special offers tailored to specific towns or cities – if your market reach extends to several locations. For, remember, celebration of Diwali varies depending on the geographical location.
• Do your financial homework
However appealing discounts and special promotions can be, they require careful planning and execution to avoid cutting into profits. Your aim is to find the ‘sweet spot’ so that you make a healthy profit, while offering customers an attractive deal.
Whichever way you choose to structure your Diwali promotion ideas, be sure to organize your finances before you get started. Don’t hesitate to get creative with your offers, so that you enjoy aggregating sales as you welcome the festival of lights or the new year.
• Use social media
Nothing captures attention like bold, colorful product photographs, and social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram are the right place to display them. If you sell beautiful gift items or home decor, set up social media pages with professional photographs of your products, each linking back to your website. Make sure to post often throughout the weeks leading up to Diwali, offering gift suggestions.
• Offer special discounts
Every year, discounts are the centre of attraction of all Diwali hype. A few popular options to consider for your business can be: Diwali-special combos, discounts for new customers or offers like – buy two get one free! This way you can easily sell the items that are less in demand by bundling them with more attractive products.
• Expand your product range
What if you find that you can’t sell your products? Try finding gifting opportunities in your current line of products. Like if you sell plants, you could run a campaign on celebrating a pollution-free Diwali, and gift a plant today! The target for such a promotion would be corporate buyers, and they may buy in bulk – to gift these to their clients and employees. What is important is that – you just need to draw a meaningful link between your products and Diwali gifting theme.
So, expanding your product range for Diwali is not a bad idea. And, for a sure fact, it might even attract more visitors to your business!
Avtar Madan
Himanshu
Shree Lahiri
Poonam Sinha
