Five St. Patrick's Day Marketing Tips

St. Patrick's Day is one filled with clover green and festivities, and it might be postulated that most people who celebrate the holiday in the United States have little knowledge of the holiday's origin - much less why there's reason to celebrate. This presents certain challenges to marketers since you don't want to look like everyone else, but you also don't want to confuse potential customers with copy and imagery they don't relate to the holiday. To fine-tune your campaign and still stand out from the pack, try these five St. Patrick's Day marketing tips.

1. St. Patty's Day symbols ... with a twist

You can and should use St. Patrick's Day symbols in your print marketing materials, since these visuals are attention-getting and bridge the connection between your customers and your St. Patrick's Day sales. Still, you don't want to be just like everyone else, so make sure you craft an incredible and unique offer that your customers simply won't want to pass up. Clovers, leprechauns, pots of gold, rainbows, Ireland, the colors orange and green and other symbols are great attention-getters, but you'll need a special offer to seal the deal.

2. Know the history of St. Patrick's Day

Just because you might know that wearing green is a St. Paddy's Day tradition because ]]>St. Patrick]]> purportedly used the green clover to explain the Holy Trinity to pre-Christian Irish, it doesn't mean your audience knows it. Thus, you're best to stick to tried-and-true St. Patrick's Day marketing themes unless you have the ability to explain your pitch. For example, you might say "Liberate yourself from high services fees like St. Patrick liberated himself from slavery," but you might want to elaborate a bit more since the fact that St. Patrick was enslaved at the age of 14 and escaped six years later isn't universally known in the Americas. Still, history and legend present many opportunities to differentiate yourself from your competitors with a St. Patrick's Day theme, one of the keys to business survival and success.

3. Make 'em green with envy

Green beer, green milkshakes, green cookies: These are all common promotions on St. Patrick's Day. Even if you're not a food service company, you can make the competition green with envy by launching a green promotion that attracts plenty of business this St. Patrick's Day. If you can't color your product green (or if no one would want a green version of whatever it is you sell), then try adopting an eco-friendly, "green" agenda by printing your promotional postcards, brochures, flyers, and posters using soy-based inks on recycled paper. This is a great PR move that also helps save the environment and can even save money. Not sure what color your postcards should be? Green, of course!

4. Market early and often

St. Patrick's Day is typically held on the 17th of March, or about a month after Valentine's Day, which gives you about 30 days to effectively promote your special sale. The key to success will be to market early and often - launch a postcard or catalog direct-mail campaign and supplement it with flyers, posters, banners, and other promotional devices to ensure your target audience is salivating for your sales.

5. Print with quality

As all great marketers know, customers largely associate the quality of your products and services with the quality of your marketing materials. If you have a poorly recorded television or radio commercial, it will reflect poorly on your company. The same goes for print marketing materials, so choose an online printing company that can offer eco-friendly green inks and paper that are high quality so your designs pop off the pages.