Seasonal Slowdowns,
and How to Avoid Them

John O'Shea

It isn’t just farmers who are affected by the seasons. Most B2B companies have seasonal slowdowns, especially around Christmas. During the holiday season, most companies put lead generation activities on hold.

It’s understandable. After all, with so few people in the office, your emails won’t be read. There’s no one around to answer phone calls – and, even if they do, your prospect is unlikely to be receptive.

But is a seasonal shutdown the right approach?

Stand out from the crowd

Most companies believe emailing over Christmas is wasted effort, so they reduce or stop their send altogether.

This is exactly why you should carry on sending.

With fewer cold emails landing in your prospect’s inbox, yours will get more attention. And, because it’s the holiday season, they’ll probably have more time to engage with your message.

Even if few meetings are actually booked during December, your outreached efforts won’t be wasted. Nurtures are always valuable, especially if they produce a January meeting.

The power of `out-of-office’

For most sales teams, the out-of-office response doesn’t bring much joy – festive, or otherwise. And, the fact is, you’re going to get a lot of them over the Christmas period.

This shouldn’t be seen as a turn-off. On the contrary, because out-of-office responses can be a goldmine of information.

Decision-makers often leave their mobile or direct dial numbers in an out-of-office reply. Not only that, they also leave contact details for people above and below them in the hierarchy. They are, in effect, referring you to their influencers.

You can build this valuable information into more advanced campaigns when they get back to the office – personalised calling or video messaging, for example.

Anticipate the benefit of January

OK, January isn’t famous for its benefits. But here’s the thing:

It may be dark, cold and depressing – but January is when prospects are most likely to buy. It’s a new year, there are new budgets and everyone is refreshed and receptive.

While few people are willing to make buying decisions over Christmas, January is a great time to be selling.

Take a look at these stats:

January is always one of our most profitable months at Growthonics, mainly because of the hard work we put in during December.

Get ready to hit the ground running

Come January, you must be primed with fresh data and fresh campaigns.

You want your January calendar to be full of meetings secured from your work throughout December. That way, you’ll catch the post-Christmas buying wave.

January’s to-do list will include ramping up sending, so do keep an eye on campaign best practice. When ramping up, there’s always a risk of inflicting permanent damage to your domain reputation and, in turn, email deliverability.

To avoid getting into trouble, consider running campaigns from multiple email accounts. If you use two separate accounts, for example, you can double your efforts while still remaining within sending limits.

Use a mix of channels

There’s much debate over which channels are most effective, but the general consensus points to email.

Our own research has found that email is 11 times more effective than cold calling.

But don’t ignore LinkedIn. Remember, this is Christmas. The majority of your prospects will be at home. They’ll be eating too much, relaxing in front of the TV and, crucially, checking in with LinkedIn on their phones.

In fact, at Growthonics we recommend running your seasonal campaigns using a combination of email, LinkedIn, phone and video messaging. This mix of touch points is the best way to swerve the seasonal slump and get the new year off to a flying start.

Book a call today to learn what Growthonics could do for you.