The Silly Season Is Coming: Is Your Marketing Ready?
I know, I know. We’re only just heading into October, and I’m already talking about Christmas.
But if you run a business, particularly in hospitality, retail, e-commerce or events, the silly season doesn’t start in December. Your marketing for it starts now.
Every year, I see businesses hit November and suddenly realise they need Christmas campaigns, festive menus, function promotions, gift vouchers, Black Friday offers, Christmas trading hours, social content, email campaigns, graphics, signage and about 47 other things yesterday.
Then everyone wonders why they’re stressed.
So consider this your friendly reminder from someone who’s worked through more silly seasons than I care to count: get organised now.
At Creative Little Soul, we work across hospitality, events, retail and e-commerce, so we see firsthand how quickly this period ramps up. We also know that good campaigns need more than a last-minute social post and a festive Canva template.
Start with the dates that actually matter
Christmas is only one piece of the puzzle.
Depending on your business, the next few months could include end-of-year functions, Christmas parties, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, school holidays, summer activations, New Year’s Eve, Boxing Day, gift voucher sales and January campaigns.
If you’re in hospitality, now is the time to start pushing Christmas functions and group bookings. People are already discussing where the work Christmas party will be, who is organising it and how much everyone is prepared to spend.
If you wait until December to promote December functions, you’ve missed a huge chunk of the booking window.
Map out the dates relevant to your business and work backwards.
Give people a reason to choose you
The silly season is noisy.
Every business is promoting something. Everyone has a Christmas special. Everyone wants people to book, buy, visit, click and spend.
Simply posting “Christmas bookings now open” probably won’t cut it.
What makes your offer worth choosing?
Maybe it’s a Christmas function package that makes organising the office party ridiculously easy. Maybe it’s a limited-edition product, gift bundle, summer menu, special event, gift-with-purchase or an experience people can give rather than another thing that ends up shoved in a cupboard.
For hospitality venues especially, I’m a big believer in creating experiences and giving people a genuine reason to visit now rather than “sometime.” We’ve written previously about how event-led marketing can create urgency, generate content and encourage repeat visitation.
Please don’t rely solely on social media
You knew this was coming.
Social media should absolutely be part of your silly-season strategy, but it shouldn’t be the entire strategy.
Organic reach can be unpredictable. Algorithms change. People miss posts. And during the busiest advertising period of the year, you’re competing with a ridiculous amount of content.
This is where your database becomes incredibly valuable.
Use email to showcase your Christmas offers, gift guides, functions, events and trading information. Segment your audience so you’re not sending exactly the same message to everybody.
Use SMS strategically for urgency: final tables, tickets nearly sold out, last shipping dates, flash offers or reminders.
And make sure everything ultimately leads somewhere useful — ideally a website that makes it incredibly easy to book, buy or enquire. Your website remains an owned digital asset and can connect your forms, database, e-commerce and automations rather than leaving your entire strategy at the mercy of social platforms.
Automate what you can now
One of the biggest mistakes businesses make is waiting until they’re slammed to start thinking about systems.
That’s backwards.
Set up your automations before things get crazy.
Think abandoned carts, enquiry follow-ups, booking reminders, post-purchase communication, gift voucher emails, welcome sequences and re-engagement campaigns.
Good automation isn’t about bombarding people with more messages. It’s about sending relevant communication at the right time, based on what your customer has actually done.
When December arrives, and you’re already juggling customers, staff, stock, functions and Christmas chaos, you’ll be very grateful that some of your marketing is quietly doing its job in the background.
Get your creative sorted early
Your designers, photographers, printers, marketers and suppliers are also heading into their busiest period.
If you know you’ll need Christmas menus, function packs, social graphics, email campaigns, posters, signage, gift vouchers, packaging or promotional material, brief it now.
Good creative needs time.
And please, don’t run exactly the same Christmas artwork 14 times with “BOOK NOW” slapped across it.
Campaign fatigue is real. Change your messaging, creative and angle throughout the campaign rather than repeating the same thing until your audience stops noticing it.
Don’t forget January
This is the bit businesses often miss.
They spend all their energy getting to Christmas Day and then marketing completely falls off a cliff.
But January can be an enormous opportunity.
People are on holidays. They’re socialising. They’re travelling. They have gift cards to spend. They’re looking for things to do, places to eat and ways to enjoy summer.
Before you shut the laptop for Christmas, know what your January marketing looks like.
Your future self will thank you.
The silly season doesn’t have to be chaos
I’ve been doing this long enough to know that October can feel ridiculously early to start talking about Christmas.
It isn’t.
The businesses that make the most of the silly season aren’t necessarily the ones with the biggest marketing budgets. They’re often simply the ones that planned ahead, knew what they wanted to sell, had their campaigns ready and communicated consistently.
So get the calendar out.
Work out your offers. Brief the creative. Build the emails. Check your automations. Get your function packages online. Start growing your database. And for the love of all things festive, don’t leave everything until December.
Your December self has enough to deal with.
If you need help getting your Christmas and summer marketing sorted, my team at Creative Little Soul can assist with strategy, email marketing, SMS, copywriting, creative, hospitality marketing, event campaigns and the systems behind it all.
Get ahead now, so when the silly season hits, your marketing is already doing the heavy lifting.
