7 Ways To Do Holiday Marketing Right: 2017 Edition

1: Don’t do it

Not everyone celebrates your holidays. Statistics show that the majority of people on the planet live in other countries that don’t necessarily celebrate the same holidays you do. Even your close neighbors may view your hallowed tradition as the commemoration of when your people showed up to make everything worse.

Columbus lands in the "new world".
Landing of Columbus, used entirely without permission in keeping with the spirit of this post.

2: Don’t do it

That picture of the cute _____  you’re using violates someone’s copyright.

Dog not happy about being wrapped as a gift.
I stole this picture from someone. It may be out of focus, but it’s still copyrighted.

3: Don’t do it

Holiday marketing is 37% less effective* than other lazy marketing ploys, including even sending pictures of your office dog in costume for National Sea Monkey Day (16 May) and using QR codes in your ads.

Comic book ad for sea monkeys.
Caricatures shown not intended to depict Artemia.

4: Don’t do it

Not everyone looks forward to holidays. Comic film star Charlie Chaplin, the King of Soul James Brown, Czech theologian and natural scientist Václav Prokop Diviš, and Santa Baby vocalist Eartha Kitt all died on Christmas Day.

5: Don’t do it

No one who actually reads your best wishes believes you mean it anyways.

Harrison Ford as Han Solo in Star Wars rolls his eyes.
This one is definitely gonna get me sued.

6: Don’t do it

Other people may celebrate that same thing at some other time or in some other way. For example, the new year is marked on at least 17 different dates around the world**, including 21–22 Sep 2017 and 16 Feb 2018. New Year’s Eve on 31 Dec is a full 10 days later than the actual 2017 winter solstice, when people who use science to understand things mark the real change in our planet’s annual trip around the sun.

Diagram showing the Earth's tilt during solstices.
Cover your eyes and move along if you think the world is flat.

7: Don’t do it

Pumpkin spice is not a strategy.

Possibly fake bag of pumpkin spice Doritos.
Yuck.

Special Bonus Holiday Marketing Strategy

“Don’t be like Ronald Reagan.” Time-honored advice from digital marketing guru Marshall Kirkpatrick.

Ronald Reagan advertising Chesterfield cigarettes.
I still have a bad taste in my mouth.
*I made this number up.
**I also made this number up.

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