Back to School Retailers Dream!

Five Lessons From The 2nd Biggest Marketing event of the year...It's Back to School time (B2S) and that means shopping of course! I'm teaching a class at the local university and even I went back to school shopping this year. By now if you're a back to school shopper you're probably done with clothes and shoes and you might be into or just finishing the list is additional school supplies. How do we know where to go for our back to school products? It might be the store local to you, it might be the place that your parents always took you when you were growing up, but it's also likely that it's the place the marketers tell us to go! 

Outside of Christmas, Back to School is big! It just is! So here are 5 lessons for marketing for back to school. 

1) Online "holiday/event" or real-life holiday/event it doesn't matter, you can still use this event to promote, sell, and share. If you're not in a traditional B2S industry, get creative about your marketing. Or just jump on the bandwagon and say you're celebrating this year. Just make sure you know your marketing strategies for back to school before you jump in.

2) Leverage the (#) hashtag. Make sure any digital marketing you do for B2S includes the #backtoschool hashtag and other relevant hashtags. Don't forget to use you're branded hashtag! Go ahead and join the conversation. #helpingsmallbusinessesgethitononline

3)Look at your product selling history to identify the product trends for back to school and then boost sales by doing live, video demonstrations, or sharing graphics about how your product fits into peoples school lives.

4) B2S is all about kids. If you have a kid-friendly product get kids involved in your campaigns. If your product or service is adult-focused build campaigns around phases like " young at heart" "you're never too old for back to school", etc.

5) Generate buzz with giveaways. Who doesn't LOVE a free giveaway? Create online contests to get consumers excited about your product or service. 

What is your best B2S product or service and how did you market it this year? Pop over to my FB page and share what you did with the small business community.