Holiday giveaways are the easiest ways to build goodwill and generate publicity. It also draws the attention of regular customers and general audiences, resulting in free publicity for the brand. As high inflation threatens to overwhelm the holiday season, a giveaway might just be the right boost your business needs.
One such business that has consistently been a part of community outreach is Bubba’s Fat Burgers. The restaurant, along with sponsors, hosted its fifth annual Thanksgiving giveaway event at the Yamboree Fair Grounds in Gilmer.
Bubba’s Fat Burgers Holiday Giveaway
James Brown is the owner of Bubba’s Fat Burgers Restaurant and is popularly known as Bubba in the community. He is known for having a big heart and believes that God has called him to serve his community through his restaurant.
Bubba organizes the free Thanksgiving lunch every year, and mainly advertises to first responders but everyone is welcome. This year, too, hundreds of people showed up to grab a free Thanksgiving lunch. For Bubba, it is the time to express how thankful he is and show his appreciation for the community. It was the fifth annual Thanksgiving giveaway, and Bubba couldn’t be prouder of his local community.
“It’s a chance for people to get together and this is the season of Thanksgiving. We have so much in this country to be thankful for,” Gilmer resident Andy Gibson told the media. Sponsors also expressed their happiness at being part of this community outreach, wherein everyone comes together to share a meal irrespective of social and economic divides.
One of the sponsors, Shayne Wilson, revealed that Bubba’s Fat Burgers is known for feeding the community and that people are happy to contribute to the annual event. The Thanksgiving lunch included all of the traditional holiday food and everyone was grateful for the annual giveaway.
Why are holiday giveaways necessary?
Mainstream holidays wherein people get together are a good opportunity to showcase business values and express their gratitude to customers.
Holiday giveaways can be in cash or kind, offline or online. But there is no denying that any type of giveaway generates a lot of buzz for the company sponsoring it. The event also nudges people to see the business in a favorable light, as who can be mad when they are receiving free things.
Holidays are the most important time of the year, for any kind of business. Consumers spend more as they shop for themselves and extended families. A holiday giveaway manages to grab eyeballs and when strategically executed, it can also help a brand trend all over social media.
You can encourage potential customers to come to participate in offline events, follow you on social media, or share something about themselves with regard to their products, which will eventually help your business boom. Coca-Cola once ran a #Shareacoke campaign that was personal and universal to the right degree.
Doing something for the community promotes brand awareness and also invigorates the human spirit. Giveaways can also be conducted in connection with contests. Studies have found that the best time to launch contest campaigns is in June and November. Kontesapp found that an average of over 34% of new customers are acquired through contests.
How To Plan Holiday Giveaways To Benefit Your Brand?
Different giveaways help achieve different goals for brands. Your giveaway strategies must align with business goals, as when it is done right, it can boost brand awareness and promote loyalty.
Holiday giveaways are also the easiest way to start a conversation about the company, and spread goodwill via word of mouth.
1. Think About Your Customers
Before announcing a giveaway, you must be clear on what your customers are expecting from you. During the holiday season, businesses and individuals are looking for good deals, and gifts for near and dear ones. If you are a company engaged in B2B sales, you might want to offer a free trial of some product or service for a set number of days, or let your clients use something for free as a value-added service to gather feedback on how it works.
Giveaways can also be simple hampers filled with what your local community wants. The Thanksgiving meal by Bubba’s Fat Burgers Restaurant helped showcase the business’ food skills while doing a good deed that brought holiday cheer to the community. Kellogg’s Corn Flakes began the tradition of prizes in cereal boxes in 1910. Not only did it increase sales, but it also brought in more customers and helped redefine the breakfast industry.
2. Make it Inclusive
Some companies run giveaway campaigns on social media. Getting a “like” or “comment” on Facebook or Instagram is easy enough and takes little effort. It will also help you bring in new customers as social media algorithms work their magic. The system will identify the post as a popular show with more users, thereby giving your company better visibility. For brands that deal directly with consumers (D2C and B2C), social media posts are the best marketing strategies for holidays. Companies also spin it off into contests and give away new products from a holiday line. For example, a cosmetics company can give away a set of lipsticks to the one who manages to write a post about the brand’s products and garner maximum “likes.” Small Biz Trends found that the social media auto-fill option in participation forms for contests can increase conversion rates by almost 189%.
One entrepreneur who does this brilliantly is Kylie Jenner. Although a multi-millionaire, she regularly hosts giveaways for her fans, who imitate her own look on their account or engage with her app.
3. Leverage the Holiday Aspect
While a Thanksgiving or a Christmas might not apply to every customer, find a way to make it inclusive for everyone. You can add hashtags and captions that broadly classify it as a holiday giveaway and mention the company values that align with it. People have different religions and ideologies, so you do want to antagonize one group while attracting the other.
A year back, in the US, digital wallet company Venmo did a giveaway wherein it encouraged people to reshare its post with a GIF. The creators of the best GIF would win $500. Not only did the brand do something that promoted its product, it also pushed people to follow it on Instagram and create a GIF for some money. Venmo refused to associate it with any particular festival and ran the campaign as a holiday giveaway. The majority of social media giveaways run for less than a week, and are a great way to grow your audience.
As the holidays draw near, people are in a giving mood and will appreciate the help from local businesses. Assistance League found that over 30% of annual donations occur between Thanksgiving and the new year with the majority of those gifts occurring in the final three days of the year. Holiday giveaways also encourage future purchases and brand engagement.
While the volatile economic climate wrecks most plans, holiday giveaways might just be the thing that will get people back to exploring their favorite brands.
