6 Tactics to Make Your Startup’s Revenue Pop in Q4’s Final Weeks — KITE Solutions Inc.
It’s the final push in Q4, the equivalent of football’s two-minute drill. You’re working every angle to exceed your numbers for the year. You suspect that with the holidays your time is even more limited than the clock and calendar suggest. Which plays are you going to deploy in the face of scarce time, attention and budgets?
This is a topic we hear every year, so thought we’d provide some opportunity areas where others share your urgency to deliver their best results in this period. The central theme for targeting tactics is to align with marketers’ product seasonality.
Holiday sales in 2014 are expected to account for roughly 19 percent of the retail industry’s annual sales of $3.2 trillion, according to the National Retail Federation. Sales — excluding autos, gas and restaurants — are expected to increase to $616.9 billion. That means Q4 represents a variety of revenue opportunities for retailers, brands and startups alike addressing consideration to conversion goals.
Here are six tips to keep in mind:
1) Christmas is essentially “summer” for the home entertainment industry. Film, television series and games sell a significant volume of annual home entertainment products during Q4. The bad news is they start planning budgets in August, but there might still be opportunistic and innovation budgets available.
2) Gifting categories drive subscriptions — think Beer of the Month or Birchbox. Up to 70% of club sales happen in Q4.
3) New Year’s represents opportunities in weight loss, relationships and healthier habits (also known as the three D’s: dieting, dating and detox)
4) January-February kicks off tax industry advertising, another industry that does nearly all of its annual revenue in April.
5) There are also a large number of opportunities for startups during the Super Bowl. Focus on automotive, telecom, consumer packaged goods and travel industries, which advertise heavily during this time.
6) Finally, there are the “use it or lose it” budgets aligned with the calendar year. Have your sales team identify every client or agency’s client whose fiscal year lines up with the regular calendar year. Next, see if they have budget they need to spend or risk losing for 2015.
What are industry seasonality trends you’ve seen and which are the best times to approach? Please add your contributions in the comments below.
Here’s to a great final push ftw for the year. May you hit your goals and rack up extra points.
Originally published at https://www.getkite.co on November 24, 2014.
