On Twitter the marketing frenzy begun a few days ago, but only recently “V-Day” became an active trend. Tweets like “Make your love sing, give your honey V-Day bling.” followed by links to sites that “sell” the bling are as frequent as those that inquire about Valentine’s Day the movie. Will it be worthwhile, will it be a flop and more importantly, will you go to see it on Valentine’s?
As any other trend, “V-Day” is a blessing for marketers, and a major annoyance for some – let’s call them more skeptical – users. But the fact that the vast majority is interested in Valentine’s Day ideas remains. This is an opportunity for all companies to boost sales numbers via Twitter.
For those with a strong Twitter presence, followed by thousands, marketing becomes easy: the right tweet with the right link and the right hashtag gets picked up and retweeted. The message becomes viral, in real time, and it’s also displayed by Google on its “real time” results on the first page of the search engine. Marketing on Twitter these days has a further reach than a press release – in fact, for such situations, press releases become obsolete.
The easiest way to maximize V-Day exposure would be to create an appealing landing page and then to tweet about it. Writing compelling tweets is an art, as you will see.
A tweet like “Sortprice Rolls Out Valentines Day Gift Guide and Top Ten Romantic Gifts” is cold, and it lacks user focus. The media on Twitter is highly social, the users like to know that they are treated as individuals with identity and not as a mass of consumers. Same goes for “74% of the US eats out on V-Day. Get 80% off every order at Restaurant.com” – but given the high numbers you can expect that Restaurant.com will attract many visits these days.
Another good strategy is to offer to the V-Day shoppers as many freebies as possible: “Your one-stop #V-Day #shop! Receive #FreeShipping, Free #TeddyBear, #FreeCard, #Rose #Jewelry Box. Use code freebear.”
On the other hand, the following tweet is a no-no: “Still looking for the perfect gift for V-Day. Check out our huge selection of earphones and headphones.” What can be less romantic on Valentine’s than a headphone?
Another bad strategy: “V-Day Fragrance Sale. Coupon LOVEVAL £3 discount when You spend 30£ Valentine’s Day FREE WORLDWIDEdelivery” – despite the discount and the free delivery offered to the purchaser, the message is focused on selling and not on providing a real value to the customer.
Maymont on the other hand has the right focus: “Maymont Mansion has many symbols of love. Visitors this Sunday will be treated to a special Love Tour!”
So don’t focus on selling everything these days – show your customers that you understand their values. Come on, people, nobody wants a wireless mouse for Valentine’s! V-Day is about love and what makes people feel in love, appreciated and pampered. So make it special, even in your sales tweets and in the message you send across the social media. And if you have nothing to offer, just wish your customers a Happy Valentine’s Day. They will appreciate this more than V-Day spam!