Key Dates Your Business Can Benefit From In 2023

New year, a new fire in your belly when it comes to your brands’ social presence, but find yourself a few months in and not much has changed? This post will help with that. 

Whilst it can seem that there is a National Something Or Other Day constantly, it would be remiss to ignore them all, as it might just be they provide you with anything from inspiration to a tool to advance your product or service. 

To help you get started, I've pulled together a handy list! 

January

DRY JANUARY

Sell alcohol so think this is off the cards for you to engage with, wrong! In fact, it allows you to show the wider reach of your offerings, such as non-alcoholic versions of beverages, or indeed soft drink options that are a little more interested than the norm. 

VEGANUARY 

Where does your brand sit with vegan morals? Are you a vegan and cruelty-free skincare brand? Now is the time to shout about it. Are you a restaurant that could look to offer more vegan options? Use it as a chance to shine and welcome those customers who may have previously felt excluded.

27TH JANUARY - NATIONAL STORYTELLING WEEK

This is a fantastic opportunity for brands, inspire customers to share their stories with you, be it about the first time they experienced your product/service. Tell the story of your brand, how did your business begin?

February

LGBT History Month

The Proud Trust training and education has a simple, easy to use, education and resource pack fo

FEBRUARY5TH: Yorkshire Pudding Day

Who doesn't love Yorkshire Puddings, if you're a foodie or drinks brand, this is a clear opportunity to develop a deeper relationship with your customers by asking them to get involved. Even if you’re not in the food industry, there’s content out there to be created.

Create a fun quiz which works out the best way to make them, eat them etc based on your job role, date of birth, favourite meal...the possibilities are endless!

You could even host a Yorkshire Pudding workshop!

FEBRUARY 13TH: PANCAKE DAY

Whether it’s a pancake race outside with all your staff which you share on social and allow customers to vote on or choose the winner, a special menu or just a special 'flipping amazing' offer for that day only, this is a day when everyone is ready to get involved for the sake of delicious pancakes.

FEBRUARY 13th/14TH: galentines/VALENTINE’S DAY

The day of love, or the day where you can share a little cynicism! Whichever works best for your business. 

Florists, make sure you have roses in stock and make it easy for people to buy, fashion stores get your date-worthy outfits front and centre, coffee shops add a free heart-shaped cookie on the side of all coffees when people share their best date stories using a hashtag you create.

Online businesses, declare your love for your own customers with a flash sale or special offer, give people time to prepare for it and stress the urgency of the sale/discount. 

March

MARCH 1ST: ST. DAVID’S DAY

St. David is the patron saint of Wales. Welsh businesses take note! Travel companies that have venues in Wales, take notice. Brands who sell Welsh items, take notice and fly the flag high! 

MArch 2nd: World Book Day

World Book Day is a charity event held annually, where every child in full-time education in the UK is given a voucher to be spent on books; the event was first celebrated in the United Kingdom in 1995.

Share your teams favourite childhood books, theme content around famous characters.

MARCH 17TH: RED NOSE DAY

No matter your business, this is a perfect time for you all to get red noses on and be part of one of the country’s biggest charity days, it's a great way to get staff and customers involved and engaging with each other. This is a fantastic opportunity to create funny or moving video content, whilst doing your bit for the charity.  

MARCH 19TH: MOTHER’S DAY

This is a wonderful opportunity to stray away from the norm, inspire customers to be kind, to share the love for their mums. Share a little insight into your team members, share candid moments about their lives, customers relate to that and it reminds them that behind every business are real people with real lives! 

If you have products that fit well with the day, then by all means share, offer and promote. Flowers, gifts, eating out etc, make sure you let them know in person, online and via mailing lists. Make it timely and focus on the feelings and memories you can create, rather than on the material possessions. 

MARCH 22nd: ramadan begins

Even if you, as a brand, don’t observe Ramadan, showing support and care for other communities and religions is always a good idea. Depending on the type of brand/business you are, you can go for something as simple as acknowledging the day, through to sharing insights from team members who observe it, or how your local community honours it.

April

APRIL 7th - 10th: EASTER weekend

Do something unexpected, as well as the usual promotions. Get the local businesses together and host an egg hunt, bonnet contest or chocolate egg workshops. There are so many engaging ways to celebrate that don't simply involve making that sale!

Don't forget your online presence too, hide Easter eggs in your images, treat customers to Easter giveaways, invite followers to get creative. 

APRIL 21ST: NATIONAL TEA DAY

Can you even be British if you don't have an opinion about tea! Fan the flames of national pride and get a conversation going! In-store give away free cups of tea, if you’re a coffee shop, concentrate on all the ways you can have tea, iced, hot, in baking... 

May

Bank Holiday - 1st, 8th & 29th 

Make the most of people having the day off work (in most cases) - give people a really good reason for getting out of the house and trying your products or services.

in 2023 we have an extra day off in May for the Kings Coronation.

Think of the things people love doing on Bank Holidays, BBQ, spending time with family, getting outside, then find a way your business can link in with that. It doesn't have to be groundbreaking, but it does need to be on-brand to convince people to spend with you.

May 20th: World Bee Day

On this day Anton Janša, the pioneer of beekeeping, was born in 1734. The purpose of the international day is to acknowledge the role of bees and other pollinators for the ecosystem.

Share recipes for honey, ways to make your work or home bee friendly.

June

June 18th: Father’s Day

If your business has items that will make dad’s day then put them upfront and centre and try putting them on offer so little ones, and slightly bigger ones, can help show their dad some appreciation on this day.

June 19th- 25th: National Picnic Week

National Picnic Week aims to provide picnic tips, picnic hotspots, and everything surrounding picnics to help the nation roll out their picnic rugs and embrace British summertime wherever you are..

Share favourite picnic treats, best places to have a picnic, gadgets for the ultimate picnic.

July

JULY 3RD: Wimbledon starts

Wimbledon is a national treasure, embrace the joy of the court.

Recipes for Pimms, if players were ‘insert your product’ who would they be, brands own tennis championship.

JULY 7TH: WORLD CHOCOLATE DAY

Everyone, take note! If you are a B2B business, send your main customers a box of chocolates, treat your staff to a chocolate bar. 

If you're a B2C business then think of the ways you can add value to customers already shopping with you.

If you have a cafe or restaurant, use this day to amplify your USP, rather than simply offering a discount on normal items, how about creating a specific chocolate menu, chocolate tea, curry, salad dressing, cocktails, they can all be created with a touch of chocolate. 

August

AUGUST 20TH: FIFA Women’s World Cup Final

After the impact of the Women’s Euros last year, we can only imagine the impact of the World Cup. Run campaigns that align with the matches, get creative with guessing the scores, discounts/offers if we win.

AUGUST 24TH: Burger day

Treat the team to a bbq, send your clients everything they need to make the best burgers. Sometimes the simple ideas are the best!

Top tier of burger joints, best toppings, how to grill the perfect patty.

AUGUST 28TH: BANK HOLIDAY

Replicate what worked in May, customers will make it clear what they engaged with most, so give them it in bucket loads!

September

September 8th: International Literacy Day

Help a local library, or school, with books. Team up with teenager youth clubs etc to help with literacy.

September 23rd: first day of autumn

New season, new trends. Focus on how your brand can add value in the new season. How to guides, best way to embrace autumn, best recipes. Get the whole team involved.

October

OCTOBER: Breast Cancer Awareness/stoptober

Get the whole team involved with something for charity. Add a donation from the business to all orders in the month. Share guidance to help people gain early diagnosis.

Support your team with quitting smoking.

OCTOBER 31ST: HALLOWEEN

Get the costumes on, seriously it's the most fun day of the year! Get the camera out and make sure your social followers know you’re taking part and give them a chance to get involved and win! in fact, Go to town on the decorations and the spooky puns! 

November

MOVEMBER

As with Red Nose Day, getting your staff and customers involved in the greater good together can only lead to great things.  health. Whether you encourage beard-growing staff to take part or stick a fake ‘tache onto others. The moustache has also become super trendy in recent years, so maybe you already have items (or have some shaped biscuits your coffee shop can bake) to sell as part of the theme and remember to have some proceeds go to the good cause it stands for.

NOVEMBER 11TH: REMEMBRANCE DAY

Whilst this is a sober event, it's important your business do its bit by showing support. Make sure your staff wear poppies, where possible, uphold the 2-minute silence at 11 am. Be aware that working this day into your marketing in any other way is likely to be considered poor taste.

December

DECEMBER 24TH: CHRISTMAS EVE

The final push before Christmas and prime for people who haven’t finished their shopping and will be on a mission to do so, make sure you’re letting everyone know that your items are the perfect finishing purchase for their Christmas.

If you're an online business that cannot deliver items the same day, then make it easy for people to purchase them and download them to give as a gift!  

DECEMBER 25TH-31ST: SALE 

Christmas Day and the week that follows is one of the busiest shopping periods online, ensure your business is set up for that push and increase in sales, especially if you have discounts.

So there you have it, a snippet of insight into some of the days you can capitalise upon, regardless of your industry!
 

7 Small Business Social Media Hacks You Can Do Right Now!

Although we are all adamant that we are too busy, I am 100% sure you have a 15 minute window every day that you could use to maximise your social presence, if only you knew how to get the most from it.

Whether you need ideas to grow your social presence or need a list of suggestions to use in those brief moments of time, these 7 things are quick ways that you can harness the power of social TODAY.

1. Where does your traffic come from?

It’s all well and good using every social media platform and marketing funnel going to drive traffic to your site, but do you really know which channels are working? To find out, log into your Google Analytics and click on the links to follow this sequence: Acquisitions – All Traffic – Referrals

You’ll see a list showing which social site is generating the most referral traffic to your website. Each site is linked to a breakdown of the actual posts people clicked on to reach your site.

Let’s say your top referral source is Pinterest. One in the Pinterest section, click on the Pinterest link and it will take you to a breakdown of the top pins/images that brought people to your site. To help you better understand what people are interested in, simply write out the top 10 pins and the number of traffic clicks from those images to my list of my top social sites.

Continue to create content in line with that style/tone/aesthetic. Give your readers what they want!

2. Check your top performing posts

Creating content takes time and effort, and you want to know that the time and effort is worthwhile, analysing your top post is a great way to inspire future content.

To access this information on Facebook, go to your business page. Look for the tab on the top of your fan page that says Insights and click on that button. Then start tracking the activity from your Facebook posts, a simple spreadsheet will do.

For Twitter simply log in, then where your profile logo is on the top right hand side, click the drop down and select Analytics, then next to Home at the top left, click Tweet and it will show you a breakdown of all your tweets.

In Instagram, go into your Insights (if you don’t have a business profile you won’t be able to see this, to turn your profile from a personal to a business one just follow this guide)

Once you have all the data, ask yourself;

• What were your top 5 posts for the week?

• What time of day were they posted?

• What day of the week were they posted?

• What was the topic or message of these posts?

• Did you add a video, photo or ask a question?

The more you check your Insights, the more you’ll start to see patterns emerge. You’ll start to see what type of content speaks more to your fans and what posts create more engagement with your potential customers.

3.  Maximise Pinterest

It’s very easy to simply create content and push it out on Pinterest, but like all social platforms, it’s a place to build relationships and utilise the content of others. One of the best ways to hep you grow your Pinterest account is to find new people who are posting new content for you to Repin on Pinterest. I usually run a search for new people and boards at least once a week.

• Pinterest’s search feature is so easy to use and it’ll help you look for new people, boards and pins. Just type in the words you’d use to run a search on Google.

• This search is a huge help to look for more content to add to a board that you just started or want to grow. You’ll be able to find people who have already done the search work and just re-pin several of their pins. And depending on their content, go ahead and follow them or just their board.

4. Update your LinkedIn profile:

Sometimes we get so busy that we forget to add what we’re working on to our LinkedIn profile. I know this one well – it happens to me all the time!

Your LinkedIn profile is super important because if someone runs a Google search of your name, your LinkedIn profile will come up as an option. This may be one of the first places where a potential customer or partner will first learn about you so you want to make sure that your information is up to date.

To update your information, log into your LinkedIn profile, go to the Edit Profile section (you’ll see the edit pencil next to all the sections) and ask yourself these questions:

• Did you recently add in a new product or service? You can add that to your profile under the Project section.

• Did you write a guest post on another blog? Add in the link in the Publications section.

• Have your services changed? Make sure you update that in your Summary section as well as in the Experience section.

5. Find new people in Instagram to follow:

Doing a search for people who do the same work as you as you do is a great way to see how others in your industry are using Instagram. Run a search for your company’s key words in the search feature { the search looks like a magnifying glass } and see who comes up.

Don’t just settle with following them, go and see who the people who inspire you, are inspired by, i.e. who they follow.

Bonus point! Make some notes about of which hashtags they use. I found several of my strongest hashtags from checking out what others who were doing the same type of work as me were using.

6. Do a mini-brainstorm social session:

Don’t rest on your laurels that done once, is done, it isn’t! So rather than keeping on simply doing what you have always done, take a little time out to brain dump content ideas, creative elements, where you could share them and how. Even doing this for 15 minutes a week, you will find yourself getting into the swing of always looking for the next batch of content, the next campaign idea, etc.

7. Read and comment on other blogs:

Take the whole 15 minutes to really read an article on a site you love, don’t just scan read it, really absorb the content, then leave them a constructive comment, mention why you enjoyed the post, what you took from it, or how you will utilise the insights. Do this twice a week, every week.

If you can’t add to the conversation, move on to the next blog post or another blogger’s site. It’s OK if it was something that was posted a couple of weeks or a month ago. The point is to spend some time crafting your comment so that you can contribute the conversation and maybe even start a connection with the author.

I really hope this helps you make the most of the little windows of time you do have in your day.

FIND YOURSELF SPENDING HOURS ON YOUR BRANDS SOCIAL MEDIA, YET NEVER GETTING ANYWHERE? MY NEW COURSE, LAUNCHING IN SPRING 2019 IS THE COURSE FOR YOU.

How To Find Your Why

“People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.” This is surely the most important aspect of the 2013 TED Talk by US-based ‘leadership expert’, Simon Sinek.  

It should be at the heart of your presence on social media, regardless of industry, offering or expertise, as much as it is a part of your offline business proposition.

Social media is a fantastic tool for finding new customers and continuing to develop relationships with existing ones, but to truly connect with others, we need to share our ‘why’.

Your business why may be rooted in a personal why, it may come from years of experience in an industry. Whatever the root of your why, sharing it with your followers reinforces a sense of trust and community. Tell your followers/community what gets us out of bed in the morning, why you are so passionate about what we do and what you believe in.

Never before have consumers been more interested in the stories behind the brands they engage with and allow into their lives, and even more so the people behind the brand.  It isn’t enough anymore to be a faceless brand who pushes content, long gone are the days of relying on print or tv media, instead you have the power right in the palm of your hand to include customers in your brand.

Thanks to smartphones and social media, we have all the tools we need to capitalise on this interest, engage with our customers and followers in a very real way, and tell them our ‘why’ through a series of posts and stories.

The beauty of social media is that it can be harnessed as a mega phone, pulling closer the millions of potential customers, it allows us to create a tribe, a community online who align with our brand.

Your business why is more than what you sell or the service you provide, instead it is the heart of your business, the thing that makes it tick. In most instances the best place to start is the reason you started your brand. You need to share your why, not just your what and how.

Not sure what your why is? Now is the time to clarify it, as it will help you to shape how you engage with people, how and where you sell your services or products and in turn allows you to find and engage with the best customers possible.

How To Find Your Why - Task One

Write anything from a sentence to a paragraph about why you started your business, what you hope to achieve and how you can impact your customers with your products or services.

If you are struggling, here are some opening lines to get your started;

I used my expertise in… to create…

I couldn’t find a product/service that worked for me, so I started…

I’m passionate about...and that inspired my to begin…

Try writing as a stream of consciousness, rather than staring at a blank page, just start writing and see what flows. Then give it a little time, go back to it and re-read to see if you think that it captures your why.

How To Find Your Why - Task Two

Who are your competitors? What do you think their why is? This might seem like a lot of work but knowing who your competitors are and what makes them tick will help you ensure that you have ownership of your space within the industry and a clear unique selling point.

How To Find Your Why - Task Three

Ask others, be it people who work in the business, or people close to you and the business. Ask them what they think your why is. Sometimes it takes the views of others, slightly out of business but close enough to understand passion you have for the brand.

Ask them to do the same as you did in Task One, write anything from a sentence to a paragraph sharing why they think you started your business, what they believe you hope to achieve and the ways that can see you and your business can impact customers with your products or services.

How To Find Your Why - What’s Next

Once you have your WHY, write it down, put it somewhere clear where you work and refer to it when it comes to every aspect of your business; be it new products/services, business growth or content both on or offline.

Next up I will share 9 examples of fantastic WHY post templates that you can use to help share the why of your brand.

FIND YOURSELF SPENDING HOURS ON YOUR BRANDS SOCIAL MEDIA, YET NEVER GETTING ANYWHERE? MY NEW COURSE, LAUNCHING IN SPRING 2019 IS THE COURSE FOR YOU.