Thanksgiving is an all-American holiday. It’s a time when friends and family gather and share a meal to show thankfulness for the past year’s blessings, and, of course, a time to kick off the holiday shopping season!
Every year, Thanksgiving kicks off the biggest weekend of spending in the United States, beginning with Black Friday, followed by Small Business Saturday, and closing off with Cyber Monday.
Due to the increase in sales and the general excitement for the holidays, Thanksgiving is the perfect time to promote your business. This article will delve into six ways you can use Thanksgiving video marketing to gain new customers and boost sales this upcoming turkey day!
Tell Your Customers You’re Thankful for Them
Thanksgiving is a time to be thankful for those you care about. As a business, who are you more grateful for than your customers?
To demonstrate your thanks, create a marketing video that tells your customers just how much they mean to you and your business!
One idea is to create a heartfelt video explaining why you are grateful for your customers’ support.
Make sure you talk to each audience member directly instead of grouping them all together. For example, say “we are so thankful for your help this year” instead of saying “we are thankful for our customers.” This one-on-one style of communication is more personal, and will resonate better with your audience members.
If you’re looking for inspiration, check out the McDonald’s “Thanksgiving Thank You” video from 2017. In the footage, the company shows a bunch of different customers enjoying McDonald’s food. The video features a voice overlay of a McDonald’s employee thanking everyone for making the brand’s food a part of their lives. Watch the video here:
If you want another idea, a second option is to make a “then” and “now” video demonstrating where you started compared where you are now. Customers love to see this transformation story, and it’s made even more powerful when you acknowledge the role that their support played in your success.
For example, if you used to ship orders solo from your basement and now you have a global business, you can create a video showing your progression and thanking your audience members for helping you get to where you are today!
Share a Thanksgiving How-To Video
Our next Thanksgiving video category is more practical. If you want to lean into educational content this November, make a video to help your audience create cute Thanksgiving decor, cook a fantastic side dish, or perfectly roast their turkey.
How-to videos are perfect for reaching your audience without bringing too much direct focus to your business. If possible, incorporate your product or service into the how-to video subtly, to promote your business without coming off as “sales-y” or inauthentic.
For example, if you sell candles, you could show your audience how to style their Thanksgiving table using your candles and other cute decorations, such as pumpkins and fall leaves.
Your viewers will appreciate that you’re teach them how to do something useful instead of just promoting your business, but the slight hint at your products or services may still encourage them to buy.
Participate in the “Giving” Part of Thanksgiving
While we often think of Thanksgiving as a time for turkey, football, and pumpkin pie, the holiday has a heartfelt side, too. Many families use Thanksgiving to celebrate people coming together and selflessly sharing with one another.
So, why not celebrate the true meaning of Thanksgiving by donating some of your proceeds to a charitable organization?
If you want to go this route, start by selecting a cause that is important to you and your employees. Then, create a video telling your audience what charitable cause you’ve chosen to support and why. Additionally, let them know if you plan to donate a portion of their purchases to the cause. Doing so will demonstrate that your company is ethical and cares about more than the bottom dollar.
As a side benefit, it may actually increase your business. According to a 2018 study, 73% of Americans consider a company’s charitable works before they make a purchase. This is especially true among Gen Z-ers and Millennials, who value companies that share their moral, environmental, and ethical concerns. Just make sure not to go this route if you’re only trying to trick shoppers into making a purchase. Viewers can sense inauthentic, self-serving content, and your video might end up doing more harm than good if the message isn’t genuine.
Share a Thanksgiving Discount or Sale
Let’s face it: Thanksgiving is a time for giving thanks and sharing a special meal, but it’s also well-known for its shopping deals. Immediately after Thanksgiving, several mega-sales occur, including Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday. In 2020, consumers spent around $39 billion during this time frame, making this the highest spending period of the year!
To ensure that your business gets in on this weekend of spending, you might want to create an informative marketing video advertising your products and sales. Creating this video will give you exposure to new customers who may be persuaded to try your products during the sale period.
Additionally, audience members who were on the fence about buying your products in the past may finally choose to take the leap due to the reduced price. Keep these videos short and sweet, and make sure to highlight the deals or discounts that you’re most excited about. Then, wait for the sales to roll in!
Create Something That’ll Make Your Audience Laugh
Thanksgiving is a goldmine for creating hilarious video marketing content. Given that many people are sharing a similar experience in homes across the country, it’s the perfect time to lean into relatable themes, such as family disputes at Thanksgiving dinner, bringing a new girlfriend or boyfriend home to meet the family, burning the one and only turkey, and more.
With this approach, you can use a marketing video to demonstrate—in a comical way—how your product or service can make your customer’s Thanksgiving better.
For example, Oscar Meyer created a hilarious marketing video showing a family eating their turkey cold cuts. The father comments, “This is like having Thanksgiving every day!” and the mother says, “Yes, but better because it’s not Thanksgiving!”
Next, the video shows the family on Thanksgiving dealing with some very relatable hassles, such as trying to keep their cool with demanding in-laws, dropping the turkey (twice), and their teenage kids being glued to their phones during family events.
This marketing video cleverly demonstrates that Oscar Meyers tastes as good as a Thanksgiving meal without all the fuss, and viewers are likely to connect with the timeless themes. If your business can poke fun at Thanksgiving challenges, you can build a light-hearted connection with your audience.
Make Something Family-Oriented
Last but not least, Thanksgiving is also a great time to create marketing videos centered around family and togetherness. If you want to highlight these values, your video should focus on ways your product or service can bring your customers closer together this Thanksgiving.
One great example of this is Coke’s “The Great Meal” video, released in 2020.
In the video, you see several families gathered together inside of their homes during the pandemic. They are cooking, eating, and drinking Coke together. They enjoy each other’s company and are appreciative of the fact that they get to share a meal. The final slogan is “together tastes better.” Take a look below:
This video subtly associates Coke with “togetherness” and demonstrates why it should be an integral part of all of your family meals—Thanksgiving and beyond.
So, follow Coke’s example and demonstrate to your audience how your products and services can help them connect with the ones they love this November!
Final Thoughts
As you can see, Thanksgiving is the perfect time to promote your business with a marketing video—and there are tons of great video options to consider. It’s not too late to commit to creating one of these concepts this year!
Whether you want to tell customers you’re thankful for them, advertise a big Thanksgiving weekend sale, or create a hilarious video based upon Thanksgiving shenanigans, now is the perfect time to expand your audience and boost sales.
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