Marketing Calendar | Creative Marketing in April, What Can You Do?

The April marketing calendar is here! No creative ideas? No outstanding design? No outstanding marketing? Please be sure to accept this marketing strategy!

April is a time full of vitality and energy, and it is a good time for marketing! Xiaopai has carefully planned a festival marketing calendar, digging deep into the characteristics and connotations of each festival, helping you seize every business opportunity and make your brand promotion and marketing more outstanding.

1. National Festival

1. April Fools’ Day

(1) Leverage elements and directions

• Elements: clowns, lively and bright colors, funny expressions, magic props, exaggerated movements
• Direction: Connect the product/brand with hot content, or create a funny secondary creation for the product/brand

(2) Points to note when leveraging momentum

• To increase the audience's sense of participation, the content format can be diversified, such as using h5 to create interactive content.
• Improve the audience's sense of involvement, combine it with life content, trigger resonance and add fun.
• Grasp the sense of proportion of "weirdness", avoid the appearance of "self-entertainment" and "excessive" content, and ensure the positive effect of marketing activities.
• Consider the target audience and design a reasonable understanding threshold for industry audiences/the general public.

(3) Reference cases

IKEA has designed a set of peripheral posters for the classic signature dish "Swedish Meatballs" in IKEA restaurants, integrating meatballs into life elements in a funny way, making them fit in with life and making people laugh.

Xiaomi released the Xiaomi 10 poster, countering the April Fools' Day prank and seriously promoting the product features on a "non-serious" day.

Six Walnuts released a set of April Fools' Day posters, selecting scenes that consumers may encounter in their lives, things that are expected but have not happened yet, getting close to consumers' lives, gaining resonance, and promoting products.

2. April 4th, Qingming Festival

(1) Leverage elements and directions

• Elements: light rain, spring, nostalgia, protection, companionship, travel, outing
• Direction: Emotional communication, emotional resonance

(2) Points to note when leveraging momentum

• Considering the festive tone, it is not advisable to do too much marketing.
• The emotions of the festival are calm and should not be exaggerated or overly passionate.
• Choose products that match the festival style and integrate them appropriately.
• The color and content design of the picture should not be too flashy.

(3) Reference cases

Ele.me released a creative seasonal spin-off short film, "Qingming Festival: Hundreds of Flavors of Qingtuan". The Blue Knight accidentally witnessed a funny battle between the traditional and novel Qingtuan factions in the Qingtuan Kingdom, which shows the evolution of Qingtuan's flavors from ancient times to the present, the possibility of novel and versatile flavors today, and the theme of embracing change in inheritance.

Luckin Coffee released a Qingming Festival poster, choosing products that fit the tone of the festival and creating an overall harmonious picture.

Gree released a Qingming Festival poster, choosing a combination of scenery and objects, cleverly combining products with nature. It is in line with the brand direction and adapts to the festival content, and the overall effect is harmonious and not abrupt.

3. April 22 is Earth Day

(1) Leverage elements and directions

• Elements: Earth, Environmental Protection, Green, Social Responsibility
• Direction: Protect the earth, introduce product design, promote brand concept

(2) Points to note when leveraging momentum

• Stay close to the topic and avoid content that deviates from the topic or is inconsistent with the topic.
• Make sure the theme of the event is clear, focused, and resonates with the audience.

(3) Reference cases

Dicos released a poster that cleverly used product shape and imaginatively sought the common attributes of the product part and the natural part, creating a connection with the festival connotation.

Pizza Hut released a poster, finding the common points between the product and the earth in appearance, and carried out design creation to achieve product and concept promotion.

Hershey's Kiss released a poster to replace the product's outer packaging with one that suits the holiday season, retaining the product's characteristics and creating a sufficient festive atmosphere to achieve sufficient publicity purposes.

4. April 23 is World Book Day

(1) Leverage elements and directions

• Elements: reading, books, knowledge, upward, growth,
• Methods: Social responsibility advocacy, brand concept promotion, experience enhancement

(2) Points to note when leveraging momentum

• Add creative design and incorporate creative elements into marketing activities to make the activities more attractive and topical, which can arouse the interest and resonance of the audience.
• Stick to the topic and avoid straying from it and causing confusion or disgust to consumers.

(3) Reference cases

Bilibili launched a set of theme copywriting with the theme of #library without books#. Using a variety of techniques, it intimately and cleverly combines the brand with the festival attributes of World Book Day, establishes the association between the brand and reading, creates a relaxing reading atmosphere, and reflects the brand's humanistic care.

Kindle, a brand that focuses on book reading, went the other way and launched the Kindle Dreamer four-piece bedding set in cooperation with Beijing Tianyukong, and released pre-launch posters and product posters. Kindle used the self-deprecating method of "reading makes you sleepy" to create a comfortable dreaming space for readers, allowing more people to feel the theme #People who read have dreams to fulfill#.

Durex released a poster titled "The Meaning of Reading" with the copy "Find the right direction and avoid detours", using a pun to link the brand direction with the festival content.

2. Solar terms and festivals

1. April 19th: Grain Rain

(1) Leverage elements

Rainwater, green leaves, flowers, farming culture, poetry, spring ingredients, health preservation

(2) Direction of leveraging momentum

Time passes, life is good, health and wellness, cultural promotion

(3) Reference cases

Guyu, a skincare brand with the same name as the solar term, released an advertising film that carries the brand's vision, reflects the brand's inheritance of Chinese culture, and promotes the brand's pursuit of calm and vigorous, gentle and powerful character.

Lao Miao Gold released a poster, integrating the brand's vision of inheriting traditional culture into the solar term poster, and incorporating the product into the poster element design. The overall design looks fresh and natural, and full of traditional charm.

Hanhou released a solar term poster, selected products that matched the style of the solar term, used the products as the main body of the picture, and designed the poster with harmonious tones.

3. Summary

Most of the festival themes this month are clear. Combining brand concepts or product features, creating creative works around the existing themes, or extending the theme connotations are the key points of successful marketing.

A rigid fit in with the theme will only disgust the audience, the trick is to cleverly find the connection points!

Author: Zhang Mulan; WeChat public account: Operation Party (ID: yunyingpai666)