So Valentine’s Day is around the corner & many people are busy musing over how they shall spend the day. This year it’s a day most people must be dreading due to the prevailing economic conditions. Despite that, the day continues to be one of the most highly anticipated days of the year especially for those who are romantically involved. No wonder it’s a day that businesses always seek ways to capitalize on so as to realize sales revenue. Global estimates place the amount of business generated on this day to have been in excess of US$20 billion last year; it’s a big day for businesses. There are several business ideas a business can tap into on this day; the key is collaboration. This article is meant to jumpstart your mental creative juices on how to make money off the day.
Source Or Offer Affiliate Marketing
Income here is earned on a referral type of mechanism which is commission-based for every sale realized or through direct sales from referrals; the idea revolves on the taking advantage of businesses with large clientele or public appeal. There are a lot business services that are highly on demand during the day e.g. accommodation, transportation, food & beverages, clothing, cosmetics etc. As a business you can strike partnerships with such service providers by referring people to them using your vast network. This works both ways, thus, a service provider can approach a widely networked business or vice versa.
Items Personalization
On a normal day anyone can randomly buy or do something for their partner right? However, on this day people strive to make their items come off in the most personalized way possible. Therefore coming up with personalized products or services that pass off as items one can gift someone with is most sought after. This domain is infinitely huge, from clothing items to utilities, gadgets, curios etc. You can enhance your initiative in this regard by partnering with arts & crafts persons, photographers, graphic designers etc.
Promotional Campaigns
Promotional campaigns come in many different forms e.g competitions, special offers, discounts etc. These will be customized to the Valentine’s Day theme so as to appeal to people. For instance, you could institute discounts on selected products or services on or from the days leading up to the day. The crux will be to drive traffic inflows & volumes of sales up.
This can be done in many ways it’s all up to your creativity. Some concepts are organizing a themed field day setup, conducting an onsite road show or arranging to have an onsite live broadcast in conjunction with a local radio station. This you will then spice up with competitions, fun games, give-aways etc. You can also throw in special offers, discounts etc. All this will be revolving around the idea of Valentine’s Day; this will attract lots of people and ultimately result in sales.
Brand Endorsements
The thrust here will be to get your products or services endorsed by a celebrity or celebrity couple (depends on what narrative you want to push, the singles or involved ones). Remember I’m using “celebrity” loosely to refer to anyone with widespread public appeal. The idea is to tap into their huge following to drive sales. You can infuse this with competitions, special offers etc.
Gift Sets
There are obviously on-demand gift items that are more or less expected in a Valentine’s Day gesture & more. Stuff like flowers, jewellery, cosmetic consumables, teddy bears, accessories and so on. You can acquire these at whole sale prices locally or outside the country. You then employ bundle pricing which entails selling multiple products bundled together at a lower rate than if they had been sold separately or individually. Profits will be earned on higher-value products that will be part of the bundle which will compensate for the lower-priced items in the bundle. The trick is to create a value perception in the eyes of prospective customers.
Specialized Thematic Branding
This will appeal mostly to leisure & accommodation service providers e.g. resorts, retreat centres, food outlets, restaurants, hotels etc. The idea is to theme everything in-line with Valentine’s Day and then create competitive & affordable packages for lovers at reasonable prices. Then you will compliment that with fringe complimentary value-added services. This will appeal a lot to lovers. Actually, globally last year, dinners topped the list of the most highly regarded and main feature of most lovers’ Valentine’s Day activities.
Organized Social Events
This is a broad field that will depend on who you want to appeal to i.e. the singles or the involved ones. You can think of this along the lines of appealing to the singles. There are a lot of single people out there and you can make loads of money from sanitising them of boredom & exclusion from the Valentine’s Day craze. I feel you can do this more effectively by organizing social events such movie nights, parties, gigs, etc. You can partner with several brands and actually sell products & services at these organized events. I bet you the singles will love it, plus it will afford them the prospects of even meeting up with potential partners.
In closing, let me point out something that’s grossly overlooked. Last year, Alibaba (the Chinese e-commerce giant), did a singles day promotion that realized at least US$1 billion worth of sales in just 85 seconds after opening of business. Ultimately the total sales for the day got to almost US$10 billion; this was an earth-shattering world record. This singles day initiative was set-up as an alternative to Valentine’s Day for those who are single. What’s my point? As much as Valentine’s Day is for those in relationships, as a business, don’t forget the singles demographic – which actually is more populated. Tailoring initiatives for your target market as the singles on that day can be a game-changer for you, sales-wise.
