Year-End Success: How To Get Your Business Ready for The Holidays
As we approach Q4 and get closer to the end of the year, it’s time to start preparing our businesses for the holiday season. It helps to plan ahead of time so your business can easily handle the inevitable fluctuations. Depending on your industry and market, you may experience an influx of business or a skeleton crew as your team takes time off to recharge with friends and family.
No matter what you’re expecting during the holiday season this year, your business will benefit from a plan of action. It’s better to get support from your team now to prepare than to wait until the holidays and leave yourself with a mountain of work. We have plenty of experience helping small business owners through the holidays. Find our best tips below.
ANALYZE MARKET TRENDS AND CONSUMER BEHAVIOR
The first step in preparing for end-of-the-year chaos is understanding what to expect this year. How did the holidays go for your business last year? Were you overwhelmed or were you prepared? Think through which strategies worked and what you might try to do differently this time around. If you experienced major business growth or other changes in the past year, make sure to factor that into your planning.
Next, look outward. Consider current market trends that could impact your success over the next few months. Researching consumer behavior can help you forecast. Try to identify emerging opportunities that you should take advantage of and determine what challenges you are likely to encounter. Review your yearly goals and understand what resources are needed to complete them.
OPTIMIZE PRODUCT AND SERVICE OFFERINGS
After you have a good idea of what to expect this year, prepare your offerings to match that need. If you’re a service-based business, start developing a schedule to make sure you’ll have enough staff to meet the demand. Do the same for your product offerings. Order as early as possible to ensure you will have the necessary inventory.
Consider developing holiday-specific offerings or promotions like bundling products or limited-time exclusives to bring in more business. Use the holidays as a way to help you meet your revenue targets by the end of the year. Create a plan with a realistic timeline to prepare these offerings and start promoting them. Begin as early as possible so you’ll be ready to promote well in advance.
ENHANCE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
The holidays are a busy and stressful time for everyone, your customers included. Make an effort to provide exceptional customer support and quick response times, especially during this season. That will keep your customers happy and appreciative that you are supportive when they need it most. If you can, streamline online and in-store shopping experiences as well.
Recommended by LinkedIn
Use marketing tactics including emails, blogs, and social media posts to build on your community and share the holiday spirit with your customers. When possible, incorporate personalization so that your customers feel seen by your business. Offer content that would be helpful or supportive during this time of year.
STRENGTHEN MARKETING AND ADVERTISING EFFORTS
Create a comprehensive holiday marketing plan. This can include any of the promotions or incentives that you’ve decided to offer your customers along with content relevant to the season. Timely and relevant content will have a good chance of reaching a larger audience and can help grow your customer base, especially when you use all the marketing channels available to you.
Give your marketing plan a specific angle or personality that drives connection. What do you want your customers to do, think, or feel during this time? Create a campaign that stands out visually and has compelling taglines and language. Try to speak to the emotions of your customers with funny, heartwarming, or meaningful content storytelling.
PREPARE YOUR STAFF AND OPERATIONS
With your marketing plans and market analysis in mind, ensure that you will have the necessary resources to succeed. Assess staffing needs and hire seasonal employees if needed. Provide training and resources to prepare staff for increased demand. As soon as possible, get an understanding of when your core team will be taking time off so you can get ahead or arrange for extra help during that time.
This might also be a great time to optimize operational systems and processes so that they can handle a higher volume efficiently. Make sure your team is aware of and comfortable with any process changes that you make. It can help to get their input when deciding what streamlining efforts to implement and then get their help carrying them out.
EASE THROUGH THE HOLIDAY SEASON WITH EXTRA SUPPORT
What’s our best advice for making it through the holiday season successfully? Get the support that your business needs!
With a Virtual Assistant comfortable with your business needs, you will have the backing that you need throughout the season. They can manage your workflows and handle the increase in daily business tasks like managing your website and email. Especially when you get started with a Virtual Assistant in advance, they can help you prepare for the end of the year and then work through it with you the whole time.