Father’s Day spending is anticipated to reach a record-breaking $20.1 billion, according to the NRF. That coupled with the fact that ¾ of Americans plan to mark the day, means there’s a huge market for eCommerce sellers to tap with a winning marketing strategy.
Father’s Day is the third Sunday of June. Sandwiched between Memorial Day and Independence Day, it does get less attention than Mother’s Day and usually garners fewer purchases for the occasion, eliminating flowers for the occasion likely plays a role.
But people are willing to buy their dad gifts — if they only knew what to get him. The fact that most Father’s Day marketing centers around boring ties and golf clubs likely plays a role in the lack of gift inspiration that prevails.
This is where good marketing enters into it. Show your customers a solution to the gift problem by offering relevant recommendations, and they’ll find things worth buying.
Follow these five steps to a winning eCommerce marketing strategy for Father’s Day.
This is where good marketing enters. Show your customers a solution to the gift problem by offering relevant recommendations, and they’ll find things worth buying.
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Follow these five steps to a winning eCommerce marketing strategy for Father’s Day.
1. Prepare Father’s Day landing pages
Create special landing pages for Father’s Day products that make it easy for shoppers to find what they want when they click on links in your communication. You don’t have to put everything on one page but plan out different ones for different price points or different product collections.
There are several options for setting this up. One way is to work off general data in the past: what sold well for Father’s Day last year to offer the items as recommendations for this year.
Another way is to work off the data specific to customer segments. If you draw on the data that Remarkety attaches to your customer profiles, it can identify segments and their shopping interests.
Yet another approach is showing what is popular this year in sales for men or gender-neutral categories and offering those are possible gifts. As new summer products are usually bought in June, it’s a good way to promote those as possible Father’s Day purchases.
This is a way to drive attention to anything giftable in your new summer line, whether it’s men’s clothing or outdoor furnishings, sprinklers or umbrellas. Anything barbeque-related is considered Father’s Day appropriate due to the assumption that all dads barbeque.
*NRF
2. Offer the father of all gift guides
In fact, though, not all dads would welcome a barbeque. But that’s exactly the challenge of finding out what a man really wants to get for Father’s Day.
Give your customers the answer in the form of a Father’s Day Gift Guide! Expand their options by reminding them that Father’s Day can be a time to show appreciation not just to fathers but to step-fathers, grandfathers, fathers-in-law, and even sons and sons-in-law.
Be sure to fill in pictures of the products and links that let them easily complete their purchase with a click. Connect the product with the type of dad, offering categories like: the new dad, the dad-to-be, the dog or cat dad, the techy dad, the athletic dad, the cultured dad, the outdoorsy dad, the foodie dad, the funny dad, the bookish dad, the dad who needs to relax.
What about the dad who has everything? That’s an opportunity to promote one-of-kind personalized gifts or gift certificates that let the dad make his own selection..
Then there’s one more category that focuses on the buyer rather than the recipient: For the thrifty shopper: gift of value and ways of shopping by savings or price with suggestions under $25, under $50, etc.
Offering gifts for these categories eliminates the guesswork for your customers. And they’d likely thank you by placing their order.
You can offer the gift guide as a download with a link in an email or a text. Or if you offer blogs, you can publish it in early June and then promote it in a newsletter, on social media, via email, and in texts.
3. Prepare a Father’s Day newsletter
Remember, as people are spending more time browsing online than in stores, they are looking to get their inspiration through brand content. Deliver on that expectation with a newsletter that offers ideas for how to celebrate the day with recipes, activities, or a card that kids can color for their dad.
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4. Reach out early and follow up
Plan a series of emails and/or texts that highlight Father’s Day. Use specific subject lines that let them know it’s about the holiday with the promise of promotions to incentivize a click.
Set up your communication strategy with Remakety templates and automation that will send the emails and/or texts or a combination of both at times you set.
Here are some suggested ones you can use early on:
- Father’s Day is in Two Weeks – Don’t Forget Dad!
- Father’s Day Savings Inside!
- The dad-approved gift guide (+ FREE shipping)
- Shop early for Dad and get FREE shipping*
- 25% Off + Free Shipping for Dad Starts Now!
- Father’s Day is June 19, Free Shipping
Subject lines to use a week before:
- Order Your Personalized Gifts For Dad By Sunday
- Still Deciding? Shop Our Father’s Day Gift Guide
- Father’s Day is Almost Here! Save 30% Off Sitewide
Subject lines that work at any point near Father’s Day:
- Great Gifts Ideas for Father’s Day
- Save 15% On Gifts For Dad
- Father’s Day! Gifts For the World’s Greatest Dad
- Dad deserves the best! 25% OFF and FREE shipping
- Gifts For the Cool Dad
- Smart, stylish, and strong – just like Dad
Subject lines for the procrastinators:
- Last chance to get your gift shipped free in time for Father’s Day!
- Don’t let Dad down: send a digital gift card today!
*NRF
5. Incentivize purchases
Offer special Fathers Day promotions. These can be a percentage or, dollars off discount or a code for free shipping or free gift wrap. You can also offer a discount off gift cards for those who want their dads to choose for themselves.
Considering offering exclusive limited-time promotion codes to your email and SMS subscribers in time for Father’s Day shipping. In addition to incentivizing sales for the occasion, dynamic coupons enable you to track the performance of your marketing campaign through Remarkety.
To reach your customers who don’t subscribe to email or SMS, offer promotions through Facebook or Instagram ads. Remarkety integrates seamlessly with your social media lists of customers to target to make sure you’re reaching everyone.
