Editor's Note: This is a sponsored blog post from Marketing AI Institute partner Persado.
We all thought this holiday season was going to be different, more “normal.” With Covid variants on the rise, supply chain issue interruptions, shipping on the fritz, the fluctuating job market, and a general feeling of burnout, it’s clear that things haven’t gotten back to normal just yet.
In a normal retail holiday season, customers may be willing to wait in longer lines, pay premium prices, and make extra efforts to find the perfect gifts, but this year people want things to be EASY: easy to find, easy to purchase, easy to ship, easy to use, and easy to return. This holiday season, the theme to focus on is EASY.
In a recent ebook, Easy is the Word: The Most Powerful Language You Can Use to Win Holiday 2021, Persado uncovers insights for marketers on how to make the holiday retail season easier for consumers using the right language powered by artificial intelligence.
Here is a summary of three recommendations from the ebook to help you get started, courtesy of Persado's AI-powered language platform.
1. Provide Relief for the Weary Consumer
Provide relief and remove pain points while your customers shop this holiday season by ensuring that your products or services are easy to find, purchase, and return.
Your customers will reward you if you create easy and flexible user experiences, seamless shopping processes, and trustworthy pick-up and/or delivery. Relief will come from a language that highlights that you authentically care about the health and safety of your customers and employees, that you’re there to serve and help your customers with their needs, and that the products they want are in stock.
2. Show Value in Your Products and Services
Everyone loves a deal, especially during the holidays. This year, however, value comes from rewarding the customers who invested time or maintained loyalty to your brand. Make loyalty worthwhile with strong customer experiences and explore ways to amp up rewards and loyalty programs so your members get real, tangible benefits from sticking with you.
3. Make Your Messages Clear and Concise
Questions and guesswork can be very frustrating for customers. Stop the confusion and proactively help them understand everything they need to know with clear and concise language. Be proactive and communication with your employees, partners, and key stakeholders. Ensure deadlines meet delivery expectations, manage supply efficiently, and clearly communicate processes to consumers, like where to pick up their online orders, for example.
Leverage the language lessons above to deliver holiday communications that provide relief, deliver value, and make things clear through the most effective retail emotions. After all, reflecting the right emotion in your customer communications accounts for 60% of the difference in customer engagement between successful messages and low-performing ones.
If you tap into the trends and needs of your customers with the right emotions, your content and communication efforts will produce winning campaigns that out-perform this holiday season. Good luck out there! To explore how Persado can work with you to make your holiday retails season a success, read the full ebook here.
Brooke Gocklin
Brooke Gocklin is Senior Manager, Content Marketing at Persado.