This is the time all of us, including our target audience, are getting into the holiday mindset. In fact, some of us have already been thinking about Christmas and other seasonal holidays for a few months. Whether you are planning holiday campaigns as a startup or you are seeking ideas that can help your customers, I’ve put together some of the social media marketing content ideas for the holidays that we are sharing with our small business, freelance and retail customers that are designed around getting the most business during this profitable time of year.

Start With Visuals Over Words

Holiday visuals, including photos, graphics and even video become more important during an emotional season like the holidays rather than the words you may include with them. Written content is not as important as the festive touches you can put on everything. That’s because these serve as symbols that bring back all the memories of happy times with friends and family during the holidays, including all the fun events. In this case, less is more. Here are some ways to incorporate these visuals on social media:

• Change profile and cover photos to reflect holiday symbols.
• Add holiday symbols to your logo if it works well, such as a tree, baubles, Christmas lights or a Santa hat.
• Incorporate your own photos of the holidays, including your decorated office, staff in ugly Christmas sweaters or anything else that illustrates how your company is embracing this time of year.
• Use holiday hashtags to get your holiday promotions across and include them in all visuals on your social media profiles.

Inspire Urgency in Shoppers With Limited Offers

Your content should also focus the idea of the limited opportunity they have to take advantage of anything you are promoting. This incites urgency and a rapid response to your call to action. Your visual and written content should focus on highlighting the restricted timeframe and quantity that your offers are available for so you can maximize the response from that specific promotion.

Focus on the Joy and Less on the Selling

Other social media content should step away from the idea of selling entirely. That’s because many people become fatigued by all the products and things they need to buy during the season. It’s refreshing for them to see simply happy holiday content that gives them a much-needed break and connects your brand with positive messages. Some ideas include:

• Sharing great holiday stories submitted by customers or employees regarding what the season means to them or their favorite holiday tradition.
• Creating a fun holiday trivia contest with a prize to test everyone’s knowledge of holiday traditions.
• Posting stories of giving from around the world, including opportunities for your audience to give to those in need and how your own organization is giving back during the season.
• Creating tip of-the-day posts that help remind your audience about easy ways to get various holiday tasks done easily and on budget.

Look Back on the Year’s Accomplishments

Also in the line of not selling, you can create content that reflects on the year in your local area, region or even country, highlighting the big and memorable events. Everyone likes to look back on how their year went. You can do this many ways, including posting about events that impacted the entire audience as well as one that highlights your own brand accomplishments. You could do this with a visual timeline, photo or video collage or snapshots over the course of a few social media posts.

Highlight any specific social causes your brand is tied to, using this as a platform to raise awareness during the holidays when others are in a giving mood. You can also share stories about the charities or organizations you have decided to help in lieu of the year’s events.

Host a Live Social Media Event

Another way to use the holidays to spread positive messages in conjunction with your brand is to host a live social media event. While you can do live events that highlight your newly decorated store, you can also use it to spread holiday cheer. Host a toy drive, holiday party or customer appreciation event. Play games with your audience and give away items online during the event.

If you offer certain products that could be included in a holiday workshop and involve cooking or crafting, post about them on Facebook. Illustrate how you are out in the community helping out and giving back. This will probably be some of the most fun you will have marketing.

Look Ahead

Be ready to go with after-holidays content related to what your audience is going to be thinking about while they are off work and as they head back after the holidays. This is an ideal time to create other promotions for items they are still looking for. However, it is also the time to start sharing content related to goals they have for the new year, including losing weight, saving money and bettering themselves. Start asking your audience about their goals for the new year and prepare responses and tips related to those goals. You’ll need to have this content ready to roll out as soon as Christmas ends, so get started now!

Drew Hendricks is a business professional and works with Flint.