Looking for a unique way to boost your profits and delight your customers? You might want to give birthday marketing a try.
Birthday marketing can celebrate customer birthdays, employee birthdays, or your own birthday. You basically offer your customers an exclusive deal to help celebrate the occasion.
If you want to utilize birthday marketing into your local business plan, here’s 10 tips to help you do it…
1. Personalize your birthday message
Rather than sending out a generic message to customers, personalize them.
A personalized message means so much more than something that has clearly been sent to hundreds, if not thousands of other customers. It makes them feel valued and seen, plus it gives them something they actually want.
Don’t just personalize the message, personalize the gift too. Look at their purchase history to see the kinds of things they like to buy. Now, give them an offer they can’t refuse.
2. Choose gifts carefully
Following on from the tip above, make sure you choose your gifts carefully. That is, make sure you are giving the customer something they want.
Free gifts are a great option as they purely benefit the customer, not the business.
3. Offer birthday coupons
Who doesn’t love a money saving coupon? Give your customers a coupon on their birthday, either for your business or for a popular store/marketplace.
If the customer purchases certain items frequently, you could give them a coupon offering 50% off their next purchase.
4. Run a business birthday sale
If you want to celebrate your business’ birthday, hosting a sale is a great option.
Customers LOVE sales and what’s great about this idea is that it benefits everyone. It benefits your business as you’ll see an increase in sales, and it benefits all customers.
5. Host birthday competitions and giveaways
Birthday competitions and giveaways are another fun way to celebrate the anniversary of your business. It could be you offer the chance to win a product bundle, free services for a month, or you could give away special discounts.
Competitions and giveaways generate a lot of excitement, attracting new customers while encouraging repeat purchases from existing ones.
6. Send a card in the post
If you want your birthday message to stand out, send your customers a birthday card. Get the team to sign it, write a personalized message, and send it off. This is a thoughtful touch that the customer will really appreciate.
It isn’t often local businesses take the time to send a card to mark a birthday. You could top it off by giving them a discount or free gift next time they pop into store.
7. Let the customer come to you on their birthday
If you have a lot of customers, sending out personalized messages can be tricky. A good alternative is to get customers to come to you on their birthday.
Let customers know that on their birthday they can either come into the store or receive a discount online by using a special code.
If you give them the option to get a discount online, there is a risk this could be abused, with customers claiming it is their birthday when it isn’t. In store, you could ask for ID that clearly states their date of birth.
8. Carry out Random Acts of Kindness
Show you care by carrying out random acts of kindness to celebrate a birthday. This idea works best when you are celebrating the birthday of your business. You could carry out random acts of kindness in the community, for your employees, or for customers.
9. Record a video message from the team
If you want to make customers feel extra special on their birthday, record a video message. This is something not many businesses do, so it would set your local company apart while making the customer feel valued.
10. Host a birthday event
Why not go all out and host a birthday event that customers can attend?
It could be a birthday party in store, with refreshments and snacks available while customer’s shop. Or you could run a birthday sale, transforming the store with balloons and birthday themed decorations.
These are just 10 birthday marketing tips you can follow to boost sales, improve customer satisfaction, and raise brand awareness. If you don’t know your customer’s birthdays, start collecting them. Just remember to follow appropriate data collection regulations.