Now that the holiday sales season is in full swing, you may be wondering what post-holiday marketing you can do to sustain sales into the new year. You are not alone. Many businesses experience a sharp drop in sales after the holiday season is over, but there are some marketing strategies you can use to help your bottom line.

Cross-sell

Review your holiday season orders. Are there complementary product recommendations that you can market to your customers? For example, if you own a retail store and someone bought a sweater, is there a scarf that you can market? to boost revenue If you own a custom t-shirt apparel business and someone purchased a sweatshirt, can you market sweatpants or hats to them?

Talk to Your Employees

Your employees service your customers on a daily basis. They led your customer's shopping experiences, answered shoppers' questions, and heard their preferences during the holiday shopping season. Was there something that customers were requesting that you don’t carry or didn’t have in stock that would have made a sales conversion? Gather that information and use it to develop post-holiday sales and marketing strategies.

Read Customer Reviews

Similar to talking to employees, read your customer reviews and identify customers' wants and needs. Pay attention to what they liked the most. Can you do more of that? Are there new items that you can add to your product line to increase sales going forward?

Share Your Story

People love a feel-good story. Do you have a great holiday story? Did you make seasonal donations or give to a charitable organization? For example, did you donate a percentage of sales, or did you donate unsold inventory? Consumers have been known to support businesses that give back to the community. This is a way to gain brand awareness as well as brand loyalty.

Gift Card Reminders

Use your email marketing or social media platforms to remind customers about using their gift cards. Create a sense of urgency by highlighting the gift card expiration date. Many people purchase more than the gift card amount so if they use their gift cards in your store or on your e-commerce website, you may be able to generate an increase in sales.

Launch an Email Marketing Campaign

Utilize your subscriber list. Design and launch an email marketing campaign to engage with customers on a regular basis.

There are many ways that you can prepare for post-holiday sales. Planning is the key. Each company’s selling strategies will be different based on the industry, customer needs, and products or services sold. Using the strategies above, you can develop a plan to maintain or increase sales.