How to increase your sales in the fourth quarter

How Your Business Can Kick@#$ in the Fourth Quarter 2017

Written by on November 8, 2017. Posted in Marketing Blog.

Your business success for the year is not over! There is still plenty of time to make a huge impact on your business by marketing online. Here are three key things you can do to kick@#$ in the fourth quarter of 2017.

Since we’re already in the second week of November, I’m not going to waste anytime. I used several of these techniques last year to instantly boost sales and exposure for my clients.

Most notably, I helped create and market a Black Friday sale for a fitness company called Kettlebells USA (I later learned why so many people/businesses have a problem with this company, but that’s a story for another day). The end effect was a significant boost in sales made through actions that started just 10 days before Black Friday.

So, here we go! How to make the fourth quarter 2017 awesome for your business…

#1: Create a Limited Time Sale (e.g. Black Friday)

Yes, you need to have a Black Friday sale. A lot of people poo poo the idea of getting involved in the mass consumer hysteria that is Black Friday, but you’ll rarely find a significant company or brand that doesn’t join in. The reason is simple: they work!

You’re not marketing to the throngs of lunatics invading Walmart, you’re promoting to your current and prospective customers that are already interested. These people just need a reason to buy, and a time-limited sale is the perfect way to do that.

Beyond Black Friday you have the opportunity to create deals for Christmas and New Years. Here is a short list of potential sale ideas:

Percentage Discounts on Specific Products, Product Categories, or Services
Percentage Discounts on All Products/Services
Unit Volume Discounts (e.g. 2 for the price of 1)
Dollar Volume Discounts (e.g. spend over $50 for free shipping)
24-Hour Flash Sales

Whatever you do, make it time limited! If you need some help with ideas, or would like us to help you execute a Black Friday campaign, Click Here to schedule a free consultation.

#2: Do All the Online Marketing Stuff You’ve Been Too Busy For

Some businesses roll over and die as soon as Thanksgiving hits… don’t be one of them! If your business has slowed down after a busy summer/fall, use the extra time to start pushing your online marketing efforts. Now is the time to get in good marketing habits, and better yet, turn a slow time of the year into a busy one. At the very least you’ll be setting yourself up for a killer 2018.

Here are a few simple online marketing tasks that you can start doing now. Try to do at least one of them every single day:

Post about your business on your personal social networks
Post about your business on your business social networks
Write an article on your blog (if you don’t have a blog shame on you, but for now, post on LinkedIn)
Learn how to make basic graphics for your blog (Start Here)
Submit your business website to online directories for backlinking/SEO (never pay for it, Click Here to learn more)
Start writing a weekly Press Release and submit to free press release websites (again, never pay, Click Here to learn more)
Start a social network account for your business on every network

Basically, try to make an effort in some way, shape, or form to get active online and generate traffic. If you want an excellent and specific guide to doing this strategically, read my book Unconventional Marketing.

#3: Get Serious About Your Website (or Start One for the Love of God)

I build websites for small businesses, so of course I’m going to push this one 🙂 You need to have a website for your business!

Over 45% of businesses still don’t have a website, and I’m sure you’re starting to realize that the internet is not going to go away. Even long-standing businesses that seem to have nothing to do with online business are now realizing that a website is an essential component of modern organizations.

If you have a website, here are a few ways you can turn it into a money maker for your fourth quarter:

Install a store component and start selling your products and services online (I use Woocommerce for my client websites most of the time).
Install Google Analytics and start tracking your traffic, then compare it to your sales.
Create banners and landing pages for your end of the year sales (see item #1 for sale ideas).
Revamp your homepage to focus on your end of year sales.
Start posting an article, infographic, or press release on your website daily (see item #2).

If don’t have a website, get going! If you’re super-duper dedicated to getting it done, someone like me could do it in as little as 2 to 3 weeks (this really depends on your decisiveness and responsiveness to the set up process).

If you need a website before the new year, here are a few options and approximately what they will cost: