What Customers Buy on Valentine's Day

Every year people search for the perfect Valentine's Day gift for him or for her, and businesses try to answer the question, "What will people buy on Valentine's Day?" While there are some tried-and-true Valentine's Day gifts, such as jewelry, flowers, chocolates and candy, the reality is that customers buy virtually everything for Valentine's Day gifts. Every person is unique in likes, dislikes, hobbies and passions; and many people want to break the mold and give their significant others something specially tailored to their personalities. Thus, the sky is the limit for Valentine's Day purchases - and the real key to making Valentine's Day sales is not what to sell but how to sell it. Crafting an incredible offer is vital, targeting the right demographic audience is essential, and presenting a compelling pitch through attention-getting copy, design and placement is crucial.

Understand customers' motivations

The first thing you have to consider is your customers' motivations. What type of customer would make a purchase from you for Valentine's Day, and why? Your marketing must cater to that demographic, and on gift-giving holidays such as Valentine's Day you would be wise to launch a multi-front marketing effort.

You might want to sell a hot, new GPS device to married men in their mid-30s, for example, so you need to be able to reach this demographic to let them know you have the device on sale for Valentine's Day so they can tell their wives they would like to receive it as a gift. Direct-mail catalogs, brochures, postcards and well-distributed posters are great ways to reach this demographic. At the same time, you might also want to target the wives of these men by mailing a printed booklet with the best "Valentine's Day Gifts for the Man Who is Impossible to Buy For" or a similar theme. Remember that the person who actually makes the Valentine's Day purchase is in many cases not the end recipient, so you have to target both the gifter and the giftee to maximize results.

Create a strong offer

Your Valentine's Day offer must also be significant in order to lead customers away from your competitors. A free gift is worthless if nobody wants it, but a 20 percent off sale could be just the thing to convince customers to splurge on that big-ticket item. Again, the more you know about your buyer and the recipient, the better you can position your offer to entice them into spending their money with you. Everything else being equal, free headphones with the latest MP3 player might be enough to tip the cash register scales in your favor this Valentine's Day. Trying to answer the question "What do customers buy on Valentine's Day" is like trying to answer the question "What do people want to own?" The answer is different for everyone, and so the more you work toward clearly understanding what your specific target audience (read: perfect customer) wants, the larger your return on investment this Valentine's Day.