The Oracle: Issue #2

THE ORACLE - OCTOBER ISSUE - #02
YOUR GUIDE TO THE
12 MONTHS OF CHRISTMAS
JAN - Party Time!
Time for a big reset to prep for
the new year.
Throw a carefully planned and
marketed NYE party of the
century, wrap up any straggler
events on Jan 2nd and sign off
for well earned quiet period!
Now’s the time to reward
your hardworking staff, who
missed out on all the fun with a
generous party on you to help
them ‘blow off steam’.
that’s right - 12!
FEB
- Data Analysis
This is your chance to examine
the data. How did you do?
What worked, what didn’t?
Where are the missed SpH
opportunities? What challenges
and opportunities does this
year’s calendar present?
Now’s the time for a careful
review of the season and
to respond with a first draft
business plan, including your
intentional marketing budget
for the festive season ahead.
MAR
-
Opportunity
Hunting
As the darkness starts to lift
and spring breathes new life
into your energy reserves, take
the opportunity to contact
suppliers with your Christmas
plans.
The earlier you secure supplier
sponsorships and deals, the
more likely you are to benefit
from their budgets before
they’ve spent them. The early
bird secures the print budget
for their marketing assets.
APR
-
Get Down To
Business
Time to revisit your business
plan and nail down the details.
By now you should have an idea
of your Christmas offer and it’s
target revenue and profitability.
Explore as many partnership
and supplier opportunities as
you can, and take consultation
on marketing strategies.
Knowledge is power. Why plan
with pure optimism, when you
can define your spend, revenue,
and profitability using proven,
expert advice.
Christmas comes early in hospitality -
in fact it never goes away. Alex Lewis
lays out the 12 steps to a successful
Christmas, so you can schedule your
optimal plans across the calendar year.
MAY
- Content Creation
Content is king. Create it early.
You can always produce more
tomorrow, but if you miss
the boat now you might find
yourself taking blurry, panicked
photos on your iPhone later.
By May you should be: giving
your creative team the go
ahead; pre-buying digital
ad spaces (before the price
goes atomic); planning your
digital and print ad ideas; and
capturing all of the Christmassy
photos and videos you’ll need -
at a cut-price shoot.
JUN
- Build Your Bases
Well here we are again..
Summer has just begun and
it’s time to dust off the santa
suit and pre-launch the early
bird Christmas packages to
corporate spaces.
Hopefully you have a good
database to work with. At this
point you need a really good PR
team behind you, and ideally,
targeted digital marketing
support to help you secure
those early sales and grow your
first party data base.
LATEST INSIGHTS
JUL
-
Prepping For The
Public
AUG
- LAUNCH!!
SEPT
OCT
- Sell, Sell, Sell - Get Tactical
NOV
- Christmas Mode
DEC
- CHRISTMAS!
Keep the corporate push
running in the background, begin
awareness marketing to the
public, and start your recruitment
and resourcing journery.
Even if the messages don’t hit
the press yet, journalists have
started making enquiries and
you want to be one of the first
they hear about from your press
team.
Exactly when your promotional
team pull the trigger depends
on your product, but by now
everyone needs to know what
the offer is and have their plan in
place.
Drop Christmas - hard!
Newsletters, go live on your
website, digital marketing, PR,
print materials.
Hopefully you have achieved
a succesful pre-launch phase
and towards the end of
August you’ll move onto a less
generous early bird offer. This
is your chance to follow up and
close warm leads.
Depending on your plan, this is
the busy reservation and upsell
phase. You’re in the press,
everyone is resharing your
Instagram ads, your ticketing
partner is reporting record
sales...
You should also be on final
stage interviews with staff. If
you’ve planned early enough,
you should have a great pool of
best-in-the-market individuals
to carry you through Christmas.
If you haven’t sold out the
bulk of Christmas within the
October period, that’s OK - but
you should be making some
serious headway by now.
October is the time to get
tactical: return to bookings to
upsell; revisit leads that have
dropped off; review your digital
marketing, refresh your content
and hone your offerings.
With Halloween out of they
way, your venue should be
ready to miraculously switch
on Christmas. Get ready to
crack open the mulled wine
and singlehandedly reduce the
productivity of the average UK
worker by about 25% for the
next two months.
Top tip: Check the performance
of your tech early in the month.
Your digital & PR campaign will
be humming in the background
to keep footfall coming in, and
mop up any extra NYE sales
whilst they’re at it.
You’ll be too busy serving
satisfied customers, checking
Google reviews and responding
gladly to glowing Facebook
feedback to focus on much
else. After all you need to be
ready for NYE and to do it all
over again.
Alex Lewis, Co-Founder of
Purists of Play
34
35