[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text disable_pattern=”true” align=”left” margin_bottom=”0″]Whilst Christmas is (rightly) seen as one of the best times of year to ramp up email marketing campaigns, that shouldn’t mean it’s the only time to do so. In fact, imaginative, engaging and well-thought-out Easter campaigns can have an equally positive effect, with much of this being bona-fide “quick wins” as they require very little in terms of time or financial investment.

This is all provided, of course, that marketers manage to avoid using too many eggscruciating Easter puns.

Bank on the holiday

Whilst not everyone has time off at Easter, the majority will. Typical office workers, for example, have an extra-long weekend off, with Good Friday and Easter Monday combining to make a four-day break. Even those in retail are still guaranteed a little extra time off, with shops operating reduced hours over the weekend and being closed altogether (by law if they are over 280 square metres) on Easter Sunday itself.

This all means that people will typically enjoy a little more time off than they ordinarily would. Time which can be spent getting around to making those purchases they’ve been weighing up for some time.

This time off is something that could work to a disadvantage as well, so businesses should certainly bear it in mind. Just as it may not be wise to send intensive, B2B emails at 4:30 on a Friday afternoon, it may also not be sensible to do so in the run up to (or during) an extra-long weekend. B2C emails, on the other hand, may work best at this time and engage people at times when they’d be most receptive to such messages.

Encourage a sale

For B2C businesses hoping they can entice their contacts to make a purchase, either in store or online, time-sensitive vouchers could be the ideal way to go. An email with a voucher attached that is sent at the start of Easter can serve two purposes.

Firstly it improves brand visibility among consumers and can then be shared among the recipient’s own contacts if they think friends or family might benefit from the offer.

Secondly, it also encourages them to check out the website or finally commit to making that purchase they’ve been weighing up for some time, knowing this voucher will not last indefinitely.

For those who don’t use their voucher by the Easter Sunday, a follow-up can be sent to act as a reminder and potentially prompt a few more sales from those who may have forgotten. By Easter Sunday, of course, boredom may be setting in, which a little retail therapy can address.

Drive interaction

Some businesses may not want to give vouchers away so easily but instead make their customers work for their discount – even if the ‘work’ in question is dressed up as a game.

One way of doing this is a simple Easter egg hunt on the website, where users have to navigate through the pages in order to find an ‘egg’ that will, upon being discovered, provide a discount code for money off, free delivery or a surprise gift with every order.

This simple technique encourages users to navigate around different areas of your site in which they may otherwise not have looked. In doing so, they may then find something they like on the way, which could be a sale that would otherwise have no chance whatsoever of being made.

It’s a similar reason to why big shops have escalators going in opposite directions so you can never just hop off one and onto another, but instead must walk around past more of the stock.

Capitalise on busy markets

Whilst Easter shall forever be linked with religion, chocolate eggs and rabbits, it also goes hand-in-hand with DIY. The extra-long weekend and lengthening daylight hours prompts thousands of Brits across the land to take up their toolboxes for a spot of home renovation.

It’s not all work and no play, though, as the Easter period is also a time when many Brits look to book their summer holidays. By then they’ve booked the time off work, have put the Christmas financial woes behind them and are starting to see summer begin to emerge on the horizon.

These are just two examples of markets that begin to swell in the run-up to Easter, so any companies operating within them really need to get their campaigns off to a flying start well ahead of schedule. As above, a simple follow-up on the weekend itself should help with brand awareness and drive those potentially-lucrative clicks or visits.

New beginnings

For all its talk of chocolate eggs and time off, the original message of Easter which still pervades today – albeit vastly diminished – is one of resurrection and new beginnings.

As such, it also provides brands with the perfect opportunity to unveil a new look, design or range of products. This is especially true for clothes retailers, as they also have the changing of season to summer on the horizon, meaning that shorts, vest tops and t-shirts come firmly back in demand.

All of these tips are designed to provide ‘quick wins’ for email marketing campaigns. They can be implemented at relatively short notice, without the need for a business to make huge waves or invest days into getting the campaign going. Then who knows, with all the time left over you can dedicate the effort into finding a better Easter pun than ‘Hoppy Easter’, ‘cheep deals’ or even (heaven forbid), the hugely cliched ‘eggcellent’.[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text disable_pattern=”true” align=”left” margin_bottom=”0″]

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