How to Boost Father’s Day Gift Sales Without Advertising
Now that Mother’s Day is behind us, all eyes are on Father’s Day—especially if you are a business owner looking to get a boost in sales this June.
So how do you go about getting that boost in sales? The most obvious answer is to increase your traffic. And how do you increase your traffic? Get more exposure with people who want to shop. There are a lot of ways to get traffic, but one stands out when it comes to getting people excited to buy your products.
It’s not sending out a newsletter.
It’s not posting a cute pic on Instagram.
It’s not buying a bunch of Facebook ads…because everyone knows all of these are biased.
The one method to get your products in front of lots of eager shoppers that stands out above all the other kinds of marketing and advertising is PR.
PR is different because…
What makes PR different from all the other types of marketing and advertising is that it builds credibility.
Every ad is sponsored and people know that means they’re biased. Any business owner with the right combination of creativity and cash can sponsor an ad that says basically anything they want. I’m not here to totally discredit advertising because it is certainly good at getting more people to see your brand, but it’s less likely to earn people’s trust and get them excited to buy from you than good ‘ol PR.
With PR, a newspaper, blog, local morning TV show, podcast, magazine, or some other type of publication chooses to publish about your brand. Since you don’t buy the opportunity, it’s kind of like they are vouching for you.
That’s the magic. It’s all about building the kind of credibility for your brand that naturally and rightfully earns trust. That PR trust gives you a big point in your box when people start shopping for dad.
Also…it’s basically free
Did I mention how cost-effective PR can be?
Look, if you have ever talked to a PR firm, you know that it takes a pretty big retainer to hire a publicist, but believe me: that is not the only way to do PR.
If you can write an email, you can do PR.
You shouldn’t wait until you can afford a fancy PR firm to do PR. You can always start with small targeted efforts (pssst…like Father’s Day) and earn media placements that make a difference for your business without the help of a full-time or team of publicity experts.
Just to be clear, PR firms are worth their money because they take the task off your plate and work on it around the clock in experienced and creative ways. But communicating with the media—which is the heart of PR—is totally free and doable on your own too.
You just need to know how to write a Father’s Day Pitch
Have I convinced you that PR is for you? Well now it’s time to talk about how Father’s Day is the perfect time to start.
You have a product for dads, right?
And you know how to send an email, right?
The media is going to publish a ton of Father’s Day gift guides, just like they do every year.
And people are going to want to buy the gifts featured on those gift guides.
Putting all the pieces together, we get:
You just need to send an email about your product to the people who write Father’s Day gift guides so shoppers know what you have to offer.
It’s super simple.
The only tricky part is learning how to stand out and that’s where I come in. I can show you my OPEN Method, which is the strategy I use to get media placements for my own clients.
I have an online course that only takes about an hour to complete and shows you everything you need to know about the media, their timeline (they’re working on Father’s Day gift guides right now!), who to contact, and how to write a pitch (AKA email) that grabs their attention.
But you really need to start now.
The thing is, you don’t have too much time left before Father’s Day and this isn’t like buying a Father’s Day gift where you can wait until the last minute.
When you’re pitching the media, you need to be on their schedule and they work in advance.
You can read my blog post about lead time here to understand why right now is the best time to get on some of the most trafficked websites for Father’s Day.
And you can also check out my course on Father’s Day Gift Guides to get all the details on how to land your products in gift guides this year.
If you’re interested in doing your own PR, I highly recommend Father’s Day because gift guides are one of the easiest PR targets and the next big gift-giving holiday isn’t until winter. Plus, if you start now, you can use these same lessons for all the winter holidays too.
So don’t wait, check out the course, and in about an hour you’ll be ready to send sophisticated emails to the media and boost your Father’s Day sales!