1. Understand Your Target Audience:
Before beginning a sale, we need to understand who should we be targeting through the same. If it is a cross-border brand with Ethnic Apparel and jewelry, the audience targeting can be done for NRIs alone // however, in cases like Forest Essential, and EUME World, the sale targeting needs to happen for both, NRIs and Native Americans. Segmentation can be done based on Audience Type.
– In case we are running multiple geographies, the Top 2 geographies need to have their separate campaigns, while the remaining can be clubbed.
2. Align with Cultural Celebrations:
Prepare an annual plan at the beginning of the particular year (or have small Quarterly planning) of the events that you will be targeting. It is important to give bigger discounts in bigger events, as the buying intent is more during such times.
Target festivals like Diwali, Holi, Eid, Navratri, Rakhi, etc.
3. Offer Exclusive Discounts:
From our learning so far, the sales in the international geographies don’t alone work on vague discounting offers. Clear-cut communications are a need clubbed with precise analysis and clarity.
For example, analyse your Top 100 products based on ‘Paid Views’ and ‘Organic Views’ to understand where are maximum of the users are going. It is important to keep these products on sale to drive efficiency.
4. Optimize Website and Mobile Experience:
Ensure that your e-commerce website and mobile app are optimized for the festival experience. During Holi, the website should look vibrant with colors // during Diwali, the theme should be shiny, and in general, it is important to keep up with the color & design.
The sale communication is to be mentioned on the homepage & cart page as well.
5. Create Engaging Content:
Develop engaging content that highlights the cultural significance of your products. It is important to create buzz before the sales with engaging content. These middle funnel users can then be retargeted during the sale days. It is also important to keep up with the trend by including videos like GRWM, OOTD, etc.
6. Incorporate Social Proof:
Customer reviews and testimonials can also be used as a part of your ad. Try to include a few of them in your ads to see success buzzing up in your ad.
7. Utilize Influencer Marketing:
Collaborate with influencers who resonate with your target audience. The UGC and Influencer content has been a game changer in the e-commerce industry nowadays. Utilizing past UGC content with fresh overlays can be tried to create the perfect sale ad content. // Secondly partnership ads can be used during the sale days to amplify the sale further.
In addition to the above, on the campaign level and planning, the following are the best practices to be implemented:
1. To take pre-buzz creatives LIVE 2-3 days before the actual sale. We can run these through Demand Gen // VC Optimised campaign // ATC Optimised campaign.
2. The sales creatives need to convey the message with clarity. [Both across the graphic & content]
3. Single Image ad format & video format usually do the best during the sale days. These can be tried every time.
4. To ensure communication across Google is changed during the sale days. Tick off the below checklist
– Sitelink Extension
– Call Out
– Promotion
– Asset Groups to be updated with sale creatives
– Videos to be updated in the YouTube campaign, in case the brand has uploaded the video there.
– Demand Gen to have sale ads populated in it.
5. If possible, one day before the sale ends, the ad communication can be changed for a few of the ads creating urgency with words like ‘Last Few Hours Left // Last 1 day left’, etc.
6. Smart Ads with Strikethrough Overlay and Frames can be tried during this time, as they can work well.
7. Engage_Customer only campaign // Engage_Sale specific campaign can be started in case the brand is big and does 25-30L average ad spends a month.
8. Having a minimum cart value to offer additional discounts during sale days helps increase the AOV.
For example, offers like ‘Place order worth $250 to get an additional 20% off’ seem to have done well in a lot of brands.
