Autumn is getting closer! This is a great time of the year for a lot of reasons. Yes, it unfortunately means summer is drawing to a close, but it also means goodbye to the heat and harmful bugs that come with the season such as wasps. Autumn is closely associated with warm, comforting thoughts and smells, such as pumpkin pie or mulled apple cider to name a few.
With this in mind, it’s worth taking a look at your next content marketing strategy for your business. Seasonal marketing can draw in customers who are as fond of the season as you are, get them engaged with your business, and even make some new sales and returning customers! It’s a great goal to keep in mind, and we’re going to help. Here are some content marketing strategies for autumn that we think are worth exploring.
Recipes
Who doesn’t love to eat? Autumn is the season of harvest and, for North America, Thanksgiving, meaning lots of delicious foods such as apples, pumpkins, sweet potatoes, etc. are ready to be prepared. If your business’s website is that of an ecommerce one, as well as food-based, recipes can brighten things up!
Even if your business is more B2B, you can always provide recipes such as pumpkin pie with a gluten-free crust (if you’re a doctor or nutritionist), flavored tea or coffee reminiscent of the season, and so on. Recipes are meant to be shared regardless of your business’s type; why not join in the fun this time?
Contests
Halloween is the prime time of the year to dress up in weird, wacky, and wonderful costumes! Consider hosting a contest on both your business’s website and social media where everyone can show off their costume and win prizes. Encourage your staff to do so and have your customers vote on their favourites per category (funniest, most creative, scariest, etc.), then promote the photo gallery after the fact. Videos are a great idea for these contests, too!
Even if you don’t plan on doing a costume contest, there are many other ideas you can do such as seasonal photo contests, promotional contests with the prize being your latest limited product, and so on.
Holidays
Like we mentioned, Thanksgiving and Halloween are the big holidays to celebrate this time of the year. But did you know there are even more holidays than you may even realize? Take a look at the following list of holidays that people honour and celebrate on social media:
- Labor Day (1st weekend of September)
- Talk Like a Pirate Day (September 14)
- 1st Day of Autumn/Fall Equinox (September)
- International Coffee Day (October 1)
- Teacher Appreciation Day (October)
- Black Cat Appreciation Week (October)
- Veterans Day/Remembrance Day (November 11)
- Cyber Monday (November)
There are even more out there. The point is, if these holidays are worth celebrating at your business via social media or even advertising, there’s no reason not to! Center your content on these holidays and make it relevant to your business and how you can help your customers. For more details about celebrating holidays the right way online, check out our previous post.
Blog Post Topics
Having a blog full of seasonal information can generate interest and engagement online. If you’re concerned about what to feature that’s seasonal on your blog, don’t worry. Autumnal topics don’t have to rely only on recipes and food (especially if that’s not what your business is about).
Consider talking about rainy day activities, autumn-themed tasks to take care of such as school starting for the year, clearing the yard of leaves, or how to prepare for winter while it’s autumn—all of these could be worth talking about. Written blog posts aren’t the only thing you need to feature on a blog, either. Perhaps one or more of these examples in our post might work out better?
E-mail Newsletter Campaigns
Not everyone relies on social media to receive the latest news from your business, but everyone checks their e-mail! You can make these as seasonal as the rest of your content in terms of design, layout, and text. Sending out seasonal content via e-mail is also a good way to get people engaged (especially if they haven’t already seen your autumnal blog post or social media post).
Offline Strategies Worth Considering
Offline content marketing strategies can be used as well as online ones for autumn. Try getting children involved in a colouring contest at your business and make the prize related to it (a free sticker or stickers, keychains, free check-up on their well-being—all good ideas). Make the colouring contest related to autumn leaves that you can pin up inside of the entryway of your physical building, if you have one. Decorations inside and outside can help too, as can festive signage.
There are lots more ideas out there—feel free to use any of these in your next content marketing strategy! If you’re reluctant to say goodbye to summer still, why not check out our tips with summery ideas and prepare for next year’s campaign?
Are you still unsure about content marketing…or is a website what you’re really looking for? If it’s the latter you need, give us a call at V3 Media. If you’d like to discuss with us further about potential content marketing ideas, let us know at a one-on-one consultation—perhaps with a seasonal beverage of your choice?