For Mums Who Mean Business
It’s Christmas Day! I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for reading, and I hope you’ve found the information here useful.
The blog has been a bit quiet lately, but I’ve been working behind the scenes with plans for 2012. I look forward to sharing with you again next year.
In the mean time, have a wonderful and safe Christmas and a happy New Year.
Do you have a Christmas range?
Do you have a Christmas range for your business? If you sell products, these can be a great way to boost sales before Christmas.
If you do have a Christmas range, or are planning one, you need to get organised early, especially if you want to wholesale them. A while ago, I heard that larger shops source their Christmas items back in January/February!
Many people look for Christmas items – clothes, decorations, decor – so they can sell very well. There are also many Christmas markets you can promote your Christmas range.
To find the best time to promote your Christmas range, keep an eye on what is happening with social media and in the shopping centres. There are people who get organised early and start buying Christmas gifts early in the year! Not everyone leaves things to the last minute.
One option is to put the items in your online shop or put them quietly on your market stall when they are ready, but hold off promotion until closer to Christmas. You could also have a special preview sale available for your loyal customers to view your Christmas products early, before you have them available for everyone to purchase.
If you haven’t thought about having a Christmas range until now, it’s time to get to work and get your products organised and ready for sale.
Do something different with your cards
Everyone receives Christmas cards at Christmas. Make your cards stand out from the pack by personalising the front of your cards with these two ideas.
If you run events for your clients and take photographs and use them to create personal Christmas cards for your clients.
There are many websites that can help you with photo cards, or use some software on your computer. Find a photograph of your client and put it on the front of the card. Inside the card, include a comment about the photo and how much you enjoyed meeting them, or talk about how their contribution to your event helped make it a success.
If you have a lot of clients, then use these cards for those who have made a huge contribution to your business.
If you don’t run events, but know your customers favourite products, put a picture of that product on the front of the card, along with a note about how you’ve appreciated their custom for the year. You may also want to include a discount voucher for that product so they can treat themselves after Christmas.
Personalising your cards in this way will make your customers feel really special and show them that you care about them. It may also be a talking point and something your customers will share with others, further promoting your business.
Start planning for Christmas!
Last year, I had a series of posts called “Countdown to Christmas”, starting in October. It was quite popular, so I’ve decided to do it again, but starting earlier – in September.
I will share some tips and ideas to help you promote and grow your business in the lead up to Christmas.
The early start is so I can get more ideas in, as well as giving you plenty of time to implement any ideas you think would be useful in your business – especially if you are planning something like writing Christmas cards for all your customers!
If you can’t wait, there are more ideas for Christmas in past posts. You can find them here.
I hope you find these posts useful.
Change your site to suit the occasion
If you have ever looked at Google on a special day, you will notice they change their logo to suit special days such as Christmas, Valentine’s Day, and even special days such as Jules Verne’s birthday (this change was particularly cool).
I even noticed on Mail Chimp, they gave a rose to their mascot to hold for Valentine’s Day.
Changing your website slightly to suit the season is a great way to celebrate as well as a way to bring visitors to your website to see what you will do next.
I blogged about this a bit in the lead up to Christmas about turning your home page into Christmas Windows. You can read that post here.
You may not want to change your whole home page. Some small changed could be putting a Santa hat on your logo for Christmas, or a rose for Valentine’s day. I know I like to go to Google and see what they’ve done with their logo on their search page.
To add to the interest, try not to recycle the look each year, if you do, people may see that it’s the same and not come back next time.
Have you changed anything on your website for a season? What did you do?
We wish you a merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
I look forward to sharing with you again in 2011.
Win some goodies
Just for fun, we will be running a 12 Days of Christmas promotion. Each week day for 12 days, starting tomorrow, we will giving away some fantastic goodies, all donated by some amazing business mums.
Each prize will have something to do with the day it is on – for example we may have 5 books to give away on day 5 or a set of 7 toys on day 7, and so on.
Today we are working hard to finalise the prizes ready to launch tomorrow. If you would like to donate a prize (there are still a few gaps), just let me know.
To view the terms & conditions of the promotion, click here.
To get in early with an extra entry for every day, complete your details below. Then come back each day for an additional entry for the prizes you REALLY want.
Good luck and Merry Christmas.
Note: This promotion has now closed
Not everyone celebrates Christmas
While Christmas in Australia is celebrated by many as a cultural rather than religious occasion, there are many people who don’t celebrate Christmas at all.
As it’s almost a cultural celebration in Australia, most people won’t be offended if you send them a Christmas card or have a Christmas sale or similar.
If you know some of your clients or customers celebrate Hanukkah or Kwanzaa, you may want to find a card or research those customs to honor their traditions. This will really depend on your business and how well you know your customers. It also depends on how much time to have to research this information.
A number of years ago I was in charge of sending cards for my husbands business. One of his clients was a Jewish organisation, so instead of sending them a Christmas card, we bought a Hanukkah card for them and they really appreciated it. Going in to their office, they still had a lot of Christmas cards sent to them by suppliers and others, and a few Hanukkah cards. This small act of consideration meant a lot to them.
With the multicultural community we live it, it can be hard to respect everyone’s beliefs and customs, however when we do put in a bit of effort to consider others, it can pay off.
Do you do anything in your business to observe the other celebrations around Christmas time? If so, what do you do?
It’s been a while since I’ve done some blog topic ideas posts, so thought I’d put 5 ideas here. These will have a Christmas theme to help you get in the mood for your December blog posts.
Remember, not all of these will have relevance to your blog, so choose wisely.
I hope this gives you a few ideas to work with. If you would like to add to this list, please do.
Transform your home page in to Christmas Windows
If you’re in Melbourne, you will know the tradition of the Myer Christmas Windows. For the last 55 years, the Myer city store decorates its windows with a theme and thousands of people travel to the store just to see the story each year. For many families it is part of their annual Christmas traditions.
While most business mums I know don’t have a shop front, they do have a website. In the lead up to Christmas, you could turn your home page into your very own Christmas windows.
Sandra from Pure Earth Noosa is in the process of doing just that. Scroll down to see her stunning Christmas image. Over the next few days her whole home page will be getting in the Christmas spirit.
Depending on your website or home page, you could plan a different theme each year, build anticipation through your email list, Facebook updates and Twitter messages, even have a competition for your customers and visitors to suggest a theme for the year. Then plan the unveiling of your Christmas “window” for the year. Depending on what you do, you could also send out a media release about the launch of your window.
Do you do something special on your home page for Christmas? Share what you do and/or what you have done in the past by adding a comment.
