Utilizing major holidays in your marketing is a no brainer; everyone expects businesses to have sales and promotions on those occasions. This is why we feel overlooking unofficial/smaller holidays and designated observance days in your marketing campaigns can be a mistake.

Many companies don’t feel acknowledging holidays like the recently celebrated Valentine’s Day and Mardi Gras, or upcoming St. Patrick’s Day is necessary unless you have a business that is specifically connected to obvious themes these occasions lend themselves to. Some may even fear it is somehow unprofessional and that simply doesn’t have to be true. With a little forethought it is possible to theme your marketing message to an upcoming ‘holiday’ in a refreshing way that makes you stand out to your target audience.

We all know Valentine’s Day is akin to a high holiday for businesses like candy or flower shops… but a business doesn’t have to be directly linked to a holiday in order to take advantage of the huge marketing opportunities they offer. We recently completed an email marketing campaign for Monterey Skin Fitness offering gift certificates for facials and 25% off earlobe repair surgery during “The Month of Love”.

Though a facial might not seem like a stretch as far as Valentines gifts go, the nod to self-love pairing this promotion with something as personal as a surgery to repair an often-embarrassing problem gives certainly grabs the attention of this business’s target audience.

You don’t even have to strictly follow the expected theme if you don’t want to. A successful marketing campaign always begins with creativity and putting a clever spin on holidays like our client Kremlin nightclub in San Antonio, TX recently did with their “Valentine-Gras” event and campaign marketing it  can give your business a leg up during the slower, post-winter holiday months. We like the creativity the client had of combining two holidays, Mardi Gras and Valentine’s Day.

In addition to the well beloved and observed unofficial holidays many of us celebrate, there is quite literally a holiday for almost anything you can think of. Do a simple web search and you can find list after list of days observed all over the world. Creating a themed marketing campaigned around days like this can make your business stand out in the crowd.

For instance, did you know March 25th is Tolkien Reading Day? This observance is a gift to bookstores and libraries! Everyone knows about Earth Day (April, 22nd), but what about Professional Engineers Day (the first Wednesday in August), or International Day of the Nacho (October, 21st)? Some of these examples may sound like a stretch, but I bet there are a few smart dental offices or even toothpaste companies who will be happy to know that the first Friday in October is National Smile Day!

The point of this discussion is that the unexpected in marketing campaigns can be fun and refreshing in ways which will grab  the attention of your target audiences and make a real difference for your business.

Marketing campaigns aren’t always about growing your customer base and increasing profits; many businesses give back to their communities through causes they are passionate about. You may be surprised to find out causes you believe in have official observance days or months. The big, highly funded organizations behind these causes sometimes overshadow the lesser known and smaller groups that are just as deserving.

If you support such organizations, or would like to do so, it wouldn’t hurt to do some research into observance days. Even if your business supports local causes those are often connected to nation or worldwide observance days would allow for web, mail, and email campaigns that give extra attention to the cause and boost fund raising.

From a small local business supporting their neighborhood little league team by running a marketing campaign during national little league week (which falls on the second week in June), to more the more personal and serious issues like supporting National Suicide Awareness Month (September), awareness and observance days can be just as important to marketing campaigns as holidays.

The business world is competitive no matter what field you are in and it can be tough to create marketing campaigns that stand out enough to keep from getting lost in the constant shuffle of email, flyers in your mailbox, and assorted ads that are constantly coming at us online and in our homes. Honoring a smaller holiday or not as well know observance day to build a unique and clever theme for your next marketing campaign could shine a refreshing light on your business.