For the most part, people aren’t coming to websites directly for content anymore, which makes paid distribution more important than ever. While platforms like Facebook provide excellent access to targeted audiences, engaging those audiences in the News Feed is easier said than done in Q4 when prices and demand for reader attention are sky-high. To succeed, marketers need to get smart about their Q4 strategy.
To help you do just that, we put together a lookbook of top-performing Facebook posts from the most recent holiday season. Based on our work with hundreds of publishers, like New York Magazine, Forbes, Martha Stewart, BET, and The Guardian, this lookbook provides insights to help you succeed on Facebook this Q4, with tips tailored to each month of the quarter.
You can download the full lookbook below. Here are three tips to get you started:
October
While the holidays may still seem far off in October, it’s not too early to start preparing. To ensure success later in the season when content distribution prices will be at their highest, invest in acquiring new email subscribers in October.
Email provides an inexpensive communication channel with your readers, allowing you to keep the conversation going throughout the quarter. As a bonus, Q4 can also be an excellent time to monetize your email database due to the higher RPMs, making this a true win-win situation.
November
While the holidays can be the source of a lot of tension for marketing teams, they can also provide a sense of predictability. In the U.S. for instance, Thanksgiving week is consistently one of the top travel times. For teams distributing content, this is a great time to double-down on mobile distribution, as many people will be away from their desktops for extended periods of time (and let’s face it, checking out their phones pretty often despite being with their family). To ensure the best user experience, leverage easily consumable content that’s mobile optimized.
December
While Black Friday and Cyber Monday are the top shopping days of the year, they are not the be-all and end-all of the holiday shopping season. Many people continue shopping for gifts for their loved ones well through December, and with new retail holidays like Green Monday (the second Monday in December), there are plenty of deals to write about too.
Take advantage of the lower prices in the first week of December to distribute content about holiday shopping.
For even more great insights and top posts for each month of Q4, fill out the form below:
