Last week we released the 2017 Holiday Planner – designed to help retailers & brands get ahead of their “to do” list this holiday season. As part of the planner, we have created monthly checklists taking some work off of the marketer’s plate. Here’s what you should be looking to accomplish this August.

01. Review Last Year’s Marketing Campaigns. What Worked? What Didn’t? Why?

Take note of subject lines with high opens, did they have anything in common? What about emails with high click rates? Perhaps you used a certain design on those emails or limited your content to one promotion. Look for patterns to understand what resonates with your holiday shoppers. Once you’ve discovered what messaging and design seems to work with your customer base – test it.

02. Clean Your List

This may be one of the most arduous tasks as a marketer, but it’s arguably one of the most important. Get your deliverability rates up by cleaning out and updating your send list. Remove bounced addresses, send customers with a low engagement rate a “are you still interested in hearing from us email” and let them self-select out.

03. Identify Technology Vendors & Platforms You Want to Add to Your Arsenal

Now’s the time to do your research and vet your potential partners.

04. Optimize Your Website

While this should be an ongoing task, with the uptick in visitors around the holidays it’s imperative that you spend time tweaking and putting yourself in the shoes of your site visitors. Things to check:

• Load time – strive for 2 seconds or less
• Gaps in ability to view products, weird pagination, etc.
• Mobile friendliness of your site
• How’s the checkout process? Mobile and Desktop

05. Pinpoint Your Target Demographic 

Ask yourself, who is your ideal buyer and how can you reach them? Some of this will be driven by who is currently buying your products, but how can you capitalize on the market?

06. Advertising

If you’re not doing any social advertising, now’s the time to start. Think about running a few lookalike campaigns on your target demographic to acquire some new email addresses and visitors. Don’t forget Facebook and Instagram is a great place to connect with your existing customers as well.

07. Email Capture 

If you’re not doing so already, add a lightbox to your site to gather email addresses. This is a simple and effective way to capitalize on traffic you’re driving from social ads.

08. Staffing 

Start hiring new employees for the season rush. It may seem early, but you’ll be happy you scooped up some employees before October. This crew can help manage newer employees and will be veterans by the time November rolls around.

Campaign Spotlight: Predictive Gifting

Set up a predictive gifting campaign and help your customers buy a special something for the ones they love. While predictive gifting can be used as a year round campaign as it pinpoints gifting events throughout the year, not just the holidays, this is an especially relevant time to get started with this new and innovative campaign. Learn more here. 

Download the 2017 Holiday Planner for access to campaign examples and ideas, the rest of the monthly checklists, tips, a printable calendar, and more.