How to drive highly qualified leads during the Christmas period

Around November each year, I am asked similar questions from my clients.

The conversation is typically around engagement with social media over the festive season. I'm generally asked questions like... “Does traffic on LinkedIn slow down? What happens to engagement when people are on holidays? Should campaigns remain active? ”

To drive highly qualified leads, it’s important for you to reach your audience with the right message at the right time. Busy professionals who don’t have much time during the working week, now find themselves with spare time to really engage and immerse themselves in the things that matter the most to them. Moral of the story: Their buying decisions don’t just stop because they are on holidays.

Here are the 3 Key Reasons to be always-on during the holidays:

1: High Consideration Purchases and B2B purchases have extremely long sales cycles, some decisions take 18+ months before the final decision is made. The prospective buyer will also need to consume 10+ pieces of content prior to making their purchase, meaning the content that’s consumed over Christmas, could be the piece of content that ensures you are included in their shortlist of potential vendors. 

2: LinkedIn Members spend time on our platform to to stay informed and up to date on industry trends, their intent does not change during the holidays. The Members that are on LinkedIn over Christmas, have more time to spend engaging with the content and learning more about your business and how you can help solve their pain points.

Naturally when people are on holidays they generally take the opportunity to have a technology detox, LinkedIn Members are no different. LinkedIn does experience a natural dip in daily users over the festive season but we equally and most importantly see an increase in engagement and time spent on site meaning more engagement for your brand.

3: LinkedIn works on an algorithm called a Relevancy Score which rewards companies that produce highly engaging content with lower CPCs. Every time you pause a campaign the Relevancy Score resets and you are left to build up this momentum again, however having an always-on presence will ensure that you are always reaping the rewards of creating engaging content.

So now you know why you should run content over the holidays, now let’s think about what kind of content will work best for your audience during this period.

The simple answer is short, insightful and snack-able content. What does this look like for your brand?

• Video - Video allows brands to stay visible to decision makers and also ensures you stay top of mind. It’s the perfect medium to simplify complex ideas in a visual and dynamic way. Earlier this year LinkedIn launched our native video player, if you haven't used it already now is a great time to trial your video content on LinkedIn. Remember to include subtitles or text overlays to keep your audience engaged! 

• Carousel Ads - An interactive way to tell an engaging story or provide insights about your brand to your target audience. Carousel Ads also launched earlier this year (our Engineers have had a busy year) and clients that have used them have seen engagement levels 3X higher than single image posts. You can include multiple offerings in one carousel ad and direct your audience to respective landing pages. That way you can create awareness and leverage campaign insights to find out what your audience is seeking. Alternatively, leverage the visual real-estate within the carousel to share insights and clear call to actions. 

So to answer the question "Should I leave my campaigns running over Christmas?" I wholeheartedly say "Yes!".

Keep in mind that social is a vehicle that transports traffic to your website. You don't turn your website off do you? Similarly, you must keep your social running to transport traffic back to your site, to engage with your brand and drive highly qualified leads.

The ability to access emails on our phones has blurred the line between professional and personal time. Whether we like it or not, we are always on too. 

To read more about engagement over the Christmas period, check out this post “Always on – Why your content should NOT wind down over Christmas” by Daniel Hochuli, LinkedIn Content Marketing Evangelist