A few weeks ago, we published a blog suggesting that you not slow down your B2B marketing efforts this holiday season. Software Advice recently released data collected from more than 6,000,000 unique visitors that supports and reinforces that Christmas advice.
Looking at the data, it seems the commonly held belief that ‘no one is in the office during the holidays’ may no longer be true. Or perhaps, it is all of the new mobile devices allowing businessmen to keep up with business from home while their kids are unwrapping presents.
Whatever the reason, the takeaway is clear: if other people are working during the holidays, you should be too.
We are not suggesting that you have your entire sales and marketing team come into the office on Christmas Day, but Software Advice’s research found that in terms of both web traffic and conversion activity, the days before and after Christmas see higher averages than one may expect:
(Source: Software Advice)
This graph shows that just four days before Christmas, the average web traffic is 7% higher than the monthly average. Additionally, web traffic is only slightly below the monthly average in the days following Christmas, showing that even if people are out of the office, they are still doing research on work-related purchase decisions online.
In terms of conversion (which is defined in this survey as submitting contact information via web form), the averages vary in the days before Christmas but are much higher than one would expect on the holiday itself as well as the days following. This suggests that Christmas Eve or Christmas Day are great times to send out nurture emails or a ‘holiday gift’ like an eBook download to initiate conversion. Additionally, because the B2B sales cycle is now typically three to six months, the more prospects you can convert in December, the better your sales pipeline will look at the end of Q1.
The data also shows that in terms of lead qualification, rates only deviate slightly from the monthly average in the week surrounding Christmas. Both three days before and three days after Christmas see a 12% higher conversion rate than the December average. This reinforces one of our own findings discussed in a previous blog: people who are in the office during the holidays have less work to do, and are therefore more likely to pick up the phone and be open to sales/marketing messages.
Summary:
- When it comes to B2B sales and marketing during the holidays, Software Advice’s research shows that companies stand to gain an advantage by putting in a little bit of extra effort.
- While many companies believe it is ineffective to staff sales reps and run marketing campaigns during the week of Christmas, average web traffic, conversion rates and qualification rates during this time suggest otherwise.
