15 Halloween Marketing Ideas for Your Store
Halloween is one of the most opportune events in eCommerce, riling people up about trick-or-treating, costume parties, and decorations. Use the Halloween spending hype in your favor and spruce up your online store with Halloween-related merchandise, cursed promotions, and the best marketing strategies.
Last year alone, more than 65% of Americans celebrated Halloween, which resulted in $10.14 billion in sales – a new record high. This year, it’s your chance to participate in this profitable holiday shopping season and skyrocket your income with a click-worthy Halloween marketing campaign.
To help you prepare for this year’s trick-or-treating event, we’ve created a list of 15 marketing ideas for Halloween promotions. Browse through them and use the right marketing strategy to encourage customers to visit your business this spooky holiday season.
Consider the Opportunity Cost
Yes, Halloween is big and presents a heck of an opportunity to earn good money. But before you get down to business, remember to weigh the opportunity cost.
Some of the Halloween marketing ideas you’ve encountered might be great for your store, but they all come at a certain price. Evaluate if you’re on the level with these Halloween promotion ideas and whether it makes sense business-wise. Maintain a level-headed approach and pursue only the opportunities within your budget.
After all, most things bought for Halloween are only used for one or two days a year.
Now it’s time to get your creative juices flowing.
Here Are 15 Halloween Marketing Ideas to Spark Your Spooky Campaign
- 1. Start Preparing Early
- 2. Offer Halloween-Themed Products
- 3. Halloweenify Your Store and Social Channels With Halloween Decorations
- 4. Re-Engage Last Year’s Shoppers
- 5. Greet Your Customers With a Trick or Treat
- 6. Engage Your Customers on Social Media
- 7. Organize a Halloween Contest or Giveaway
- 8. Create Special Halloween Bundles
- 9. Send Halloween Gift Cards
- 10. Create a Spooky Video, Song, or a Blog Post
- 11. Launch a Spooky Halloween Email Campaign
- 12. Share Your Team or Yourself in Costumes
- 13. Create Time-Sensitive Offers
- 14. Use Hashtags for Exposure
- 15. Run Halloween Ads to Increase Brand Awareness
1. Start Preparing Early
The one thing that always annoys customers, delivery chains, and everyone involved in the order fulfillment process is chaos. Start prepping for your Halloween marketing campaign in advance to avoid issues, bugs, overloads, and unsatisfied customers.
Another reason for starting your Halloween promotion ideas early is to beat the competition beforehand. Promote Halloween freebies, contests, discounts, Halloween-themed product designs, and epic offers early on, and send all the buyers and their holiday spirit directly to your Halloween party.
From early email marketing campaigns to promotions on Google Ads and social media accounts, grab people’s attention fast with click-worthy Halloween discounts, themed merchandise, and other grand Halloween advertising ideas. You know what they say – the early bird gets the worm. Or, in this case – profit.
2. Offer Halloween-Themed Products
Offering limited edition products is a proven way to generate excitement, and it’s one of the greatest Halloween advertising ideas used by the world’s biggest brands. Halloween-related products will ignite the Halloween spirit in your visitors. It’s one of the best Halloween marketing ideas to create hype and generate higher demand.
We have a huge range of products in our catalog, ready and waiting to be customized. We stock everything from kid’s tees to AOP shirts, shower curtains, puzzles, and even neck gaiters. With the right designs, all of them will make fantastic personalized Halloween gifts.
There are many ways to incorporate bats, witches, pumpkins, ghouls, and other spooky characters onto our products. Just pick the age group of your target market and let your creativity do the rest, one Halloween-themed design at a time.
Note. Limited edition items are perfect for Halloween promotions, bundles, contests, and giveaways. Turn from a small business owner to a successful seller with an epic holiday campaign.
3. Halloweenify Your Store and Social Channels With Halloween Decorations
Most shop owners decorate their stores to resemble the look and feel of every upcoming holiday, so why don’t you do the same? From a scary Halloween banner to completely dressing up your storefront in the ultimate Halloween costume. Transform your page into a fun shopping experience and boost your Halloween sales.
Add elements like spiderwebs and spooky fonts, redesign your hero image with skeletons and pumpkins, write an appropriate call to action, and there you have it – a Halloween-ready storefront. This Halloween marketing idea doesn’t take much effort and is truly spooktacular.
Give your site an exclusive Halloween look that gets your customers into a festive mood if you can. Focus on decorating flexible elements that are noticeable and catchy. But don’t go for an entirely new theme. It may be beautiful, but it can also be costly and cause issues with your back-end – your Halloween marketing ideas shouldn’t scare you.
Also, don’t forget to Halloweenify your social media channels. Add pictures and cover photos to your Facebook page, post promotional content and other decorations on Instagram and add other changes to make your customers’ visit more pleasant.
4. Re-Engage Last Year’s Shoppers
If you have your data from previous years’ shopping, this is a no-brainer. Your existing customers already know your brand, so if they’re happy with the service, they will likely take that chance again – telling their friends about all the fun and quality your store brings.
Besides, there are always customers who can’t wait to get started with holiday purchases. Those are the people who are more susceptible to early promotions. And here, your Halloween campaign ideas can make you a fortune. Imagine how nice it would be for them to receive early access to your trick-or-treating event, sale, or a coupon for the categories they’re interested in.
Use historical data to identify and re-target customers who will most likely return to your shop this Halloween season.
5. Greet Your Customers With a Trick or Treat
Here’s a neat Halloween marketing idea. Whenever a visitor lands on your storefront, make a pop-up that invites them to get a discount, a gift, a coupon, or free shipping.
You can design it into a game: ask your visitors to choose between a trick or a treat. Make one of them free shipping and the other one a discount. It’s a win-win either way!
Use fun ways to implement online marketing ideas and attract customers to your site and participate in your online Halloween event.
Make It Happen Today!
6. Engage Your Customers on Social Media
Creating Halloween-themed content is not enough to fully attract customers and keep them coming to your site. Engaging with them might help, though. Use the power of social media to get closer to your community and target audience with quality content and engagement.
Post interactive images, videos, reels, and more. Ask questions, suggestions, and ideas. Motivate them to share their opinions, thoughts, experiences, and feedback on you, your products, and services.
7. Organize a Halloween Contest or Giveaway
Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, or other social media platforms you’re using are great for Halloween marketing campaigns and contests. People love to get stuff for free and will be delighted to participate in the best costume or scary story competition.
Create a unique idea and use a hashtag to stay visible and attract attention.
- Halloween Story Contest. The most terrifying story wins it all.
- Halloween Candy Contest. Ask people to submit new and spooky candy flavors.
- Halloween Costume Contest. The best and scariest costume wins the prize.
- Halloween Menu Contest. Let people come up with creative dishes and food names for a chance to win a prize.
- Pumpkin Carving Contest. The most cursed pumpkin wins the show.
- Halloween Pet Photo Contest. The best and spookiest pet transformation wins.
You can plan a giveaway if you’re in a good mood and need to increase your social following. Just make sure to give away something your followers will like and appreciate. For example, Halloween treats in the shape of a gift card, Halloween-themed merchandise, free shipping, and more.
8. Create Special Halloween Bundles
Halloween is perhaps the finest time to upsell and cross-sell. If clients are buying from your store, they don’t buy just one piece of decoration or costume. They need a complete matching set.
You can help them out by preparing special promo bundles and offering them at a discount. Providing more relevant goods at a lower price will save your clients money and time and help you sell more.
Another way to tackle it is to add a freebie for purchases above a certain price level. It might be a small thing, but little things have the power to turn your Halloween campaigns from good to great.
There is no denying that bundles belong on the list of Halloween marketing ideas that you should at least consider.
9. Send Halloween Gift Cards
Send your customers gift cards that will become active during a specified period of your sales campaign. It’s a proven and straightforward approach – a simple yet great Halloween marketing idea.
It also doesn’t necessarily mean email. You can engage new customers via social media or even PPC ads.
If you have many local customers and a budget, you may even want to send out some physical gift cards to your most generous buyers. In an increasingly digital world, receiving something tangible in your mailbox is a pleasant surprise.
10. Create a Spooky Video, Song, or a Blog Post
Videos are one of the most effective ways to spread your brand’s message and showcase your Halloween-themed products and their features. 86% of video marketers admit their videos are effectively generating leads. Halloween presents a chance to be creative, memorable, and eerie. It can captivate your audience for good.
A few years back, Ford created its viral Halloween car wash prank, which was a hit at the time. Another slightly more expensive but memorable example is LG’s “So Real It’s Scary” campaign, whose participants were tricked into thinking that their elevators’ floor was falling.
YouTube and other video hosting platforms are great for Halloween promotions and testing Halloween marketing ideas. Many people love a funny joke or a scary story. Besides, creating a prank video can be a lot of fun. The only risk is going viral.
Make It Happen Today!
11. Launch a Spooky Halloween Email Campaign
Email marketing revenue is predicted to rise to $11 billion by 2023, making it an effective way to reach your target audience and promote your offers. Successful Halloween email campaigns boost sales and lure customers to your shop. You don’t even have to sell Halloween costumes or other party supplies to make the best of it.
Instead, you can package your products with a Halloween-ish spin in a subject line.
For example, suppose you’re selling t-shirts. In that case, you can always write something like “Bloodcurdling Halloween shirt deals that will make you jump out of your skin!” or just pick and personalize any of the hundreds of awesome Halloween marketing slogans easily accessible online.
Before you send out your Halloween emails, check if they:
- Have a catchy subject line
- Are clear and concise
- Have an irresistible persuasive element
- Are personalized
- Lead to clear calls to action
A surefire way to make the most of your email marketing is A/B testing. Test your emails with several customer groups and see what works best.
12. Share Your Team or Yourself in Costumes
Authentic brands are never afraid to show behind the scenes, and people love them for it. Seeing that they’re dealing with real people lets your customers feel empathy and form a deeper connection.
Get into your Halloween costumes and share the playful side of your business. Take fun pictures, videos, and stories and post them on your social media channels. Plus, it’s a fun way to introduce a Halloween contest, promotion, or giveaway.
13. Create Time-Sensitive Offers
Halloween is a limited period, which gives it a time-sensitive factor. Do you know what works best with that?
Flash sales and time-limited offers. These Halloween marketing ideas are suitable for nudging people and increasing your sales and traffic. When visitors see a deal that will end soon, they experience the fear of missing out (FOMO), which drives them toward the purchase.
An effective way to increase urgency in your store is to add a countdown timer for products on sale. This results in customers making their decisions faster.
14. Use Hashtags for Exposure
Hashtags come in handy on social media platforms. They help other people find you in their Halloween-related searches and give you extra exposure for your posts, reels, and videos, sending free traffic your way.
Use unique, location-based, popular, and promotional Halloween hashtags to drive people and interest to your brand page and raise awareness during the shopping season.
15. Run Halloween Ads to Increase Brand Awareness
The spooky season is the perfect time to introduce your brand and merchandise to a new audience. With Thanksgiving and Christmas season around the corner, use Halloween sales to raise brand awareness and popularity worldwide.
Create different ads with your products, services, and Halloween sales, and showcase them on multiple channels like Instagram, Facebook, or Google. Tell everyone about your cursed offers and send them directly to your store page with just one click.
Key Takeaways
Use these Halloween marketing tips for big and small businesses to create an epic sales campaign and turn it into a Halloween tradition.
- Start your Halloween-themed campaign early.
- Consider the opportunity costs and pursue only the opportunities within your budget.
- Halloweenify your store and social media channels.
- Re-engage last year’s shoppers and use pop-ups to grab new visitors’ attention.
- Run themed merchandising, ads, and marketing campaigns.
- Take advantage of content marketing by providing relevant content to Halloween shoppers.
- Engage with your customers on all social media platforms.
And there you have it. That pretty much covers everything you need to know to win this Halloween season and boost your sales and traffic. Be creative, spooky, and enticing.
Happy Halloween!
Make It Happen Today!
Written by
Julianna Green
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4 comments
Thank you!
Great ideas, thanks!
All cool! Can’t wait to try some of these out!
Thank you for the support Julianna! <3