We’re still in the midst of Back to School season, but the holidays are right around the corner. Is it too soon to start your holiday promotions?

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While we wouldn’t advise you to start running any ads tomorrow, you are going to want to be ready to spring into action soon. The National Retail Federation tracks when shoppers start buying gifts. For years, 40% of shoppers begin before Halloween. If you want to reach these customers, that means you need to have active promotions in place in October.

Creating targeted campaigns to reach early shoppers makes sense. You can use all of the marketing channels you have available – email marketing, social media, and in-store promotions – but research has found that PPC is particularly effective during the earliest part of the holiday shopping season.

According to Marketing Dive, there can be a real benefit for starting your PPC campaigns early. Holiday ad campaigns that begin in October have a 7% increase in ad impressions, a 12% drop in cost-per-click (CPC) and a 20% decrease in CPM (cost per thousand impressions) compared to other months in the holiday season. This is important information to have when you’re trying to control costs and improve outcomes.

PPC is an important marketing tool because shoppers don’t discriminate between paid and organic search. Early holiday shoppers, in particular, are likely to search for specific items or by location, as they still have plenty of time before purchases have to be made. 65% of purchasers click on ads during the research phase. If you’re only going to do one thing to appeal to early holiday shoppers, a targeted PPC campaign makes the most sense and will deliver the most satisfying results.

If you’re not sure how to make PPC work effectively for you, give us a call. The holiday season is too important not to make use of every available tool to build your business. We’re here to help!