I will start with this, I am not a fan of capitalizing on holidays. I think they are special periods people experience a few times a year, but with that said, what’s up with Valentine’s Day? February 14th, it is a day of love for some and loneliness for others. Everyone is reminded of whom he or she does or does not have in his or her life. It is a time of last minutes gifts, Google searches, and Amazon Prime purchases. Emotions and spending are at some of their highest times of the year. So, it begs the question, where are the advertisements?
According to Acquisio, Valentines Day is the 4th largest shopping day of the year and rakes in close to $20 billion. Over a quarter of the people will shop online utilizing mostly Google to facilitate searches and of these searches, according to Google, in “2015 there were 3 times as many searches for “gifts for boyfriend” than “gifts for girlfriend” during Valentine’s day season”. An interesting fact that I certainly did not expect.
According to Fundivo the age group that spends the most is between 25-34 and men spend an average of $196 compared to the average spend of a female to be about $100. Seems like a pretty reasonable target audience would be men and women with an ages 25-34.
Not making a splash on Valentine’s Day is a gigantic miss. It is one of the most emotionally charged holidays in a time where emotional advertising and connections are the status quo. Want to do good advertising? Create an ad that makes people feel like they would rather be single. Create an ad for lipstick telling people that this what single people wear and they could not be happier about it, or if your Applebees and want to be relevant to a younger crowd, terrible idea by the way, then put yourself out there as the place to come when you are single on Valentines Day. Offer cheap alcohol and specials on desserts and whatever else you want.
It could be Olympics, but I did not personally see many Valentine’s day advertisements. Numbers on how much is spent seem to be fairly elusive which only ads to my point. Papa John’s was brilliant on this day and they offered heart-shaped pizzas. It made my girlfriend smile ear to ear. If you are into drop shipping a niche and well-designed t-shirt to make he or she feel special would be a great idea. This is right up Coke’s alley and they could capitalize greatly off of the feeling love that is excluded, I mean McDonald’s gave it their best shot. If they can try it there is not much of a reason anyone else cannot.
Gage Bauer 