Marketing Calendar | December marketing hot spots are here, find your marketing secret code

The last month of 2023 is here! This article summarizes the five important festivals in December, provides suggestions on how to take advantage of them, and lists some brand marketing cases for reference. Next, let's take a look at which directions to focus on and make marketing activities that are in line with the characteristics of the festival and the brand. I hope it will inspire your marketing inspiration!

Before we know it, there is only one month left in 2023. The end of the year is a time for summing up and harvesting, and it is also a time to seize this special node to engage in marketing. Following the afterglow of Double Eleven, we usher in the carnival of Double Twelve; Christmas, New Year's Eve, heavy snow, winter solstice, many major nodes have arrived as scheduled.

In order to meet the needs of potential and direct customers, how can we take advantage of this opportunity to carry out precision marketing? You may wish to take a look at these leveraging directions and reference cases compiled by Xiaopai. I hope it will inspire you!

1. National Festival

1. Double 12 Shopping Festival on December 12

(1) Leverage elements and directions

Elements: shopping, red envelopes, low prices, snapping up, consumption, year-end promotion

direction:

• Continue the shopping craze of Double Eleven and continue to promote promotional carnival consumption
• Use the psychological characteristics of users' impulse and emotional consumption during the shopping carnival to create marketing activities
• Combine marketing with other festivals at the end of the year (such as Christmas and New Year's Eve)

(2) Points to note when leveraging momentum

• Break away from the homogeneous content, do not blindly reduce prices, but provide innovative activity content
• The activity should be consistent with the brand’s own tone
• Try to carry out integrated marketing and combine online and offline channels

(3) Reference cases

Wuhan Shouchuang Outlet caters to the hot spots of the Double 12 Shopping Festival and launches an H5 game with the theme of hand-shopping index, which caters to the psychology of many consumers' Double 12 shopping and promotes its own brand at the same time.

The event not only used gamification marketing, but also attracted users to participate by sharing the chance to win a prize, which made the information spread quickly. In addition, receiving prizes offline also attracted online users to go offline. Overall, this marketing campaign was very successful.

Taobao released a brand advertisement for Double 12: "Special Good Reviews", focusing on Taobao sellers from all walks of life, showing their real working conditions and the importance of good reviews to them. In this marketing campaign, Taobao's brand promotion strategy did not focus on the products themselves, but let the Taobao merchants who worked silently behind the scenes come to the fore, weakening the intermediary power of the platform and providing a real two-way feedback shopping experience. Connecting brands with consumers in a more caring way.

In addition, in terms of promotional activities, Taobao held the annual "National Taobao Festival" during the Double 12 period. The theme of this festival was "Thousands of Wonders, All on Taobao", and the products were personified to reflect the agility and fun of Taobao.

This integrated marketing further strengthened the platform's mind, allowing more special products, amazing people and amazing stores to be seen by consumers, and built an imaginative bridge between consumers and products and store owners.

2. Christmas Day, December 25

(1) Leverage elements and direction

Elements: Christmas tree, Santa Claus, elk, bells, snowflakes, gifts

direction:

• Limited-edition products and limited-edition product packaging with Christmas elements
• Create a pleasant and heartwarming atmosphere of reunion, celebration and joy
• Combine festival customs and celebrate festivals by giving gifts, shopping, etc.

(2) Points to note when leveraging momentum

• Pay attention to the Christmas family reunion and warm holiday theme.
• Integrate with people’s daily lives, and marketing content cannot be too detached from reality
• The launch of appropriate joint or limited products and activities can stimulate consumer behavior

(3) Reference cases

Uniqlo released a Christmas healing animation, in which a little bear who was anxious about hibernating received the warmest Christmas gift. The short film combines the custom of giving gifts at Christmas, and its slogan "Give your daily clothes to others at Christmas" is also consistent with Uniqlo's brand clothing products. The short film conveys a warm emotional experience to the audience.

Every Christmas, Coca-Cola releases a special commercial as promised.

In 2022, Coca-Cola brings a heartwarming and tear-jerking family story "O Natalsempre encontra o caminho (Christmas always has its way to be spent)", which tells the story of a man who is not good at cooking. When Christmas is coming, he drinks a bottle of Coke and magically sees his deceased mother. Under her guidance, he stumbles over and over to complete a sumptuous Christmas dinner and is finally able to celebrate the holiday with his friends.

Through this film, the brand conveys a heartwarming value concept: everyone has their own unique happiness, we should always keep love in our hearts, and the people we love most are by our side.

In December 2022, Holiland's Christmas collaboration also arrived as scheduled. Holiland and WallpaperSTORE launched a new Christmas series of cakes, cleverly combining Christmas elements with the brand logo, and launched a Christmas-themed packaging set.

This time, Holiland’s holiday marketing incorporates people’s Christmas thoughts into its brand marketing, cleverly conceiving each dessert and selling point, echoing the warm atmosphere of Christmas, and conveying Holiland’s theme of "Packaging a Christmas full of surprises for you with Christmas knots."

3. December 31st New Year’s Eve

(1) Leverage elements and directions

Elements: countdown, annual summary, fireworks, wishes, New Year's plan, year-end recognition

direction:

• Review the major events of the past year and resonate with the public
• Integrate the year-end summary activities with the daily life of the masses to make the brand fit the masses and increase the distance
• Incorporating good wishes such as New Year's wishes into brand marketing to bring positive emotional value

(2) Points to note when leveraging momentum

• Conduct emotional marketing to create a warm, pleasant, and positive emotional experience for users
• The year-end summary review should have brand characteristics and avoid homogeneous content
• Combined with the hot spots of the past year, it can be certain events or certain technologies

(3) Reference cases

On the occasion of the New Year's Eve of 2022, Ele.me released a short film to review the iconic products ordered by Ele.me users from January to December 2022, which also correspond to the iconic events of this year. With sounds, pictures and familiar tastes as evidence, the film looks back on the past year and resonates with people's memories.

Ping An of China has turned the internal commendation conference held by all companies at the end of the year into an immersive drama live broadcast for the whole nation to celebrate the New Year. It presents the stories behind its insurance business, human nature and public sentiment, and the fate of individuals and families to the public. It has opened up a new form of communication that connects brand promotion and channels, and uses storytelling scenes to connect brands and users.

At the node of New Year's Eve marketing, Kuaishou planned and launched the "AI Draws Your 2022" H5, using AI to draw a customized "year-end summary". The brand uses this warm, healing and technological communication form to accompany users to sort out their moods and go into battle lightly, awakening users' confidence in life and yearning for the future, and demonstrating Kuaishou's sense of social responsibility and brand values.

2. Solar terms and festivals

1. Heavy snow on December 7

(1) Leverage elements

snowflakes, winter, cold, scarf, snowman, snow

(2) Direction of leveraging momentum

• Scenes centered around "snowflakes" and "snow fields" and activities such as "skiing" and "making snowmen" are consistent with the associated images of solar terms.
• The solar terms mean that the weather is getting colder. Brands can take care of consumers by adding more clothes to keep warm.
• Visually, the white color of snow is the main tone, supplemented by some warm colors (red and yellow) to give consumers a warm feeling.

(3) Reference cases

As an adult product brand, SIKI used a double-entendre copywriting "Drive safely in snowy weather" in its poster, which not only conforms to the characteristics of the solar term, but also reflects the characteristics of the brand's products. Consumers can understand the poster without feeling offended, which is a very successful marketing poster.

A can of energy to take you on a journey through the snow and ice. Red Bull's solar term poster uses skiing scenes as the main content, allowing consumers to associate with the brand and reflecting the concept that the brand's energy drinks can stimulate sports vitality and passion.

Snow is falling, and everything is hidden. Writing in the snow reveals the purest love. The Redmi mobile phone poster uses a snowy scene as the main picture, and the white back of the mobile phone product is used as a snowy field, writing the "note" of the brand product series, cleverly integrating the characteristics of the solar term snowy day with the product.

2. December 22 Winter Solstice

(1) Leverage elements

Dumplings, glutinous rice balls, cold, reunion, snow

(2) Direction of leveraging momentum

• Combine traditional customs of solar terms and integrate traditional culture into marketing promotion
• Combining the characteristics of solar terms with brand IP will make consumers remember the brand more deeply.
• Leverage marketing based on the fact that the winter solstice has the shortest day and the longest night in the year

(3) Reference cases

Audi's winter solstice promotional posters are themed "Winter solstice, the limit is not reached yet". The two posters respectively reflect the safety performance and power system performance of Audi's automotive products. Associating the safety and braking problems faced by winter driving with the brand not only conforms to the tone of the solar term, but also reflects the high quality performance of the brand.

On the winter solstice, people in the north eat dumplings, while people in the south eat glutinous rice balls. This is a customary practice. In its poster, Three Squirrels used its representative IP image of squirrels, dumplings and glutinous rice balls as the main body, reflecting the traditional culture while showing the brand image, with a cute style that matches the brand tone.

But Xiaopai thinks that the poster may lack some text content to help express the brand concept. Text is also an important item in poster design to enhance the effect of brand promotion and information communication.

The winter solstice is celebrated with dumplings from all over the country, a rare reunion! Meituan’s winter solstice poster combines the characteristics of the short day and long night on the winter solstice, combines the solar term with the brand service content, reflects the brand positioning of “30-minute express supermarket”, and makes the selling point deeply rooted in people’s hearts.

3. Summary

The above are the marketing nodes and cases in December that Xiaopai has compiled for everyone. In December, you must pay attention to these key nodes: Double 12, Christmas, New Year's Eve, heavy snow, and Winter Solstice. Brands need to carry out activity planning based on the representative elements of different nodes and the brand's own concepts to create successful marketing by leveraging the momentum.

Seize these hot opportunities, and the next hot marketing campaign will appear! Be sure to plan ahead! I wish you all good marketing results at the end of the year!

Author: Li Zhijing

Source: Operation Party (ID: yunyingpai666)