With Diwali season around the corner brands are gearing up for festive sales and campaigns. Every festive period sees a surge of festival campaigns and online sales with big e-commerce players luring in to buy all that you added to your wishlist. A recent survey conducted by community platform Local Circles reveals that urban India is set to spend Rs 1.85 trillion this year. Despite the growing influence of e-commerce, the survey points out that 70% of urban households will stick to local and retail stores, while only 13% plan to use online platforms for their purchases.
Diwali in India is synonymous with revamping the home décor, bringing in new gadgets, gifting for households and corporates, festive groceries, and high ticket purchases including electronics and automobiles. The major spending comes from the household sectors with priority on value for money and product quality. With a surge in online shopping and the e-commerce players bringing in shopping fests, there is still a major percentage that chooses to shop from malls, retail shops, or local markets.
Diwali 2024 Shopping Trends
- 86.35% of consumers plan to purchase new clothes, garments, and accessories, making them the most sought-after category
- 72.84% of shoppers intend to buy personal gifts
- 70.83% of consumers are focused on home decor
- 60.92% of shoppers plan to invest in electronics
- 48.13% of buyers are looking to purchase jewellery
What is digital marketing strategy?
Digital marketing strategy leverages various online platforms and content marketing to enhance the digital presence of the businesses. The growing influence of social media on consumer behavior demands the brand marketing strategy to work in tandem with the digital marketing strategy and implement it to work towards enhancing the brand’s online presence.
A robust digital marketing strategy includes researching the user and buyer personas, identifying goals and objectives the business is aiming to achieve, evaluating the competitor’s digital marketing strategy, checking what digital channels work for the business and starting towards building digital marketing campaigns.
How to create a digital marketing plan for festival advertising? Ft. Diwali 2024
With the growing influence of social media and digital advertising, brands must not overlook the pertinent benefits arising from crafting effective digital marketing plan to enhance sales and brand awareness. Cultural sentiments, target audience buying behavior, interests, trends, market research, adapting to regional and cultural aspects, preferences, etc. should be taken into account while crafting a digital marketing plan for the Diwali festival advertisement.
Let’s look into effective festival advertising strategies for Diwali 2024.
Set up the mood and tone
Diwali is all about the festival of lights, crackers, decorations, sweets, gifts, new clothes, and whatnot. Festival marketing strategy planning should begin well in advance after studying the consumer behavior and trends that are going to define the season. Starting from brand narratives, visuals, copy, campaign key messages, campaign idea buckets, etc. everything that is used for communication must have one unified message of festive vigor. The tone of colors and brand voice should reflect the cheerful mood around the festive season.
Content strategy
Every communication from the brand that goes out must reflect a happy mood and tone. Thematic content is the key to spark customer interest during festival season. Diwali themed content is all about bringing in a cultural blend with stories igniting emotions; this will give your brand a chance to resonate with your audience. Usage of creative visuals that touches upon family gatherings, cheerful moods, togetherness, celebration fervor, traditions, etc. gives a personalized and genuine feel. A short film with a warm and emotional touch or a cheeky would also work well.
For instance, OnePlus’s Diwali 2024 Campaign is all about “Make it Special for Everyone”
Email marketing for E-commerce sales
If you are running an Ecommerce business email marketing can be a boon to boost your online sales. While designing your Diwali email marketing strategy aim for standing out in the user’s inbox to ensure high conversions. Design your Diwali-themed emails well in advance and begin just early enough to persuade customers to start thinking about your products.
Leverage your knowledge on traditions and auspicious days to start rolling out offers allowing you to touch upon the emotions of your prospects. Strictly avoid overdoing and bombarding with offer emails, this can be a turn off. Additionally, don’t forget to put in catch CTAs, highlight the offer prices, a crisp subject line talking about offers, and personalized recommendations based on user behavior on the platform, bring in the festive elements in the UI/UX of your website and apps, and get set go.
Performance marketing campaigns
Performance marketing enables you to target effectively and ensure efficient delivery of the planned festive campaigns. With consumer behavior data insights, you will be able to frame strategies and product placement according to what your user or prospect is searching for. Effective retargeting ads can drive traffic to the bottom of the funnel stage bringing conversions. You are able to track the data in real-time and optimize the campaign by changing the targeting and content if needed.
Social media and print ads
Digital platforms offer a range of content formats and have seen the audience engaging at a higher rate with interactive eye-catching content; this is a sign to create a festival mood-inspired social media strategy and take it big with print media. Your customer base on a social media platform ranges from tech-savvy adults to smart Gen Zs, allowing you to whet the appetite with different content palettes.
Analyze the audience demographics and behavior using analytics tools and craft targeted campaigns. Print ads backed with savage copies can result in multifold impressions from the viewers, thus boosting sales. Remember, two seconds to six seconds is the available time span you have to grab the attention of your prospects.
For instance, Pepperfry decided to stir up things early with “Why Wait for Diwali” for its Diwali 2024 campaign.
Contests, events, and hashtags
Contests are a great way to tune up the festive mood and with increasing use of social media, these contests can bring in some good engagement. Low or no shipping costs, BOGO offers, spin the wheel, Re.1 deals, limited flash deals, complete the puzzles, etc. are a few examples. To top this up, you can reach the right audience for your products or services by using influencer marketing effectively.
Different genres of influencers can help you determine what to promote by whom and to who. You can also create catchy hashtags that can garner popularity for your campaigns. Contests ranging from Diwali OOTD to Rangoli creations to recipe shares; all connect us to one common thing i.e. festive spirit. Last but not least, exhibitions are still a great way to engage the audience, giving them an opportunity to have a first-hand interaction with your brand. The same can be promoted by leveraging influencers to create awareness content about the exhibitions.
The convergence of tradition, consumer optimism, and digital influence presents a positive outlook for retailers gearing up for one of the year’s most significant shopping seasons. As trends shift, brands must adapt to effectively connect with the diverse and dynamic preferences of Indian consumers.
Looking for some festive action?
Hit us up with your requirements! At Spinta Digital, we love not just to create crazy content but also to bring your brand to life with vibrant campaigns that resonate with the festive spirit. Whether you need eye-catching social media posts, engaging videos, or viral OOH to connect with your audience, our creative team is ready to elevate your brand this festive season.
