How To Create Holiday Content That Actually Converts, No Reindeer Required
Let’s be honest: everyone sees the exact same content scrolling through their feed in November and December. Red and green gradients, stock photos of families in matching pajamas, generic holiday sale graphics with snowflakes that could belong to literally any brand. Almost every holiday post looks and sounds the same, and frankly, your audience is over it.
Seasonal content is a recycling bin for inexpensive, repetitive visuals and low-intent promotions that audiences have learned to tune out faster than ever - a candy cane graphic with a 15% off headline isn’t a strategy - and it’s just noise. In a season where consumer attention is the most valuable commodity, noise is the last thing you want to put out. The real opportunity? Holiday creatives that are culturally smart, audience-first, low-waste, and high-converting - it’s content that moves the needle for your brand, no reindeer required.
Why ‘Holiday’ Doesn’t Mean ‘Obvious’
The big misconception here is that marketers and brands assume that holiday creatives are all about the bells, bows, and festive cheer. But we’re here with a reality check: your typical holiday shopper isn’t really paying attention to any of that. The holiday shopping season actually begins in early to mid-October, with shoppers who are extremely discount-sensitive, value-focused, and increasingly driven by meaning and genuine messaging over the festive-focused ads.
Your audience isn’t trying to figure out what the most important brands are saying right now. They’re trying to figure out “what do I get for the person who already has everything? Or “How do I make hosting easier?” or “How do I make sure the family all gets along at the holiday table?”
Our suggestion? Try targeting a single, well-defined holiday micro-moment, like a limited-time bundle paired with a gift experience, which can drive far stronger results than a whole month of generic holiday season content. Having deep knowledge and understanding of your audience’s actual pain points and desires will help you win every time.
The Holiday Content Framework
The brands that get holiday creatives right consistently follow this rule: Brand first, Audience second, Commerce last. Let’s take a deeper dive into what that means.
Brand: When it comes to visual assets, start with your brand POV - what does this holiday season actually mean to your brand and your people? For Wellness brands, maybe it’s about rest and boundary setting in an otherwise crazy season. For fashion, it could be all about that killer confidence you get from a perfect outfit. In finance, it could be a late Q4 power push to get everything crossed off before the new year. Whatever your vertical, lean into your story and the real way you can help people.
Audience: Map the needs of your audience across the entirety of their holiday season journey, segment by behavior - who’s buying for whom, vs who’s treating themselves? Who’s preparing and planning for holiday hosting far in advance versus those who shop 1-2 days before their guests arrive, and what are their actual rituals associated with the holidays? Someone hosting family for the first time ever has totally different needs than someone traveling to the tropics to avoid the holiday chaos altogether.
Commerce: Your creatives also need to be easy to use in practice. Make buying obvious, fast, frictionless, and rewarding with clear CTAs, smart product bundling, fast checkout experiences, and mobile optimization. Otherwise, you’re looking at beautiful content that doesn't convert.
Five Tactical Plays You Can Use
Once you have a plan based on the above three categories, here are five different strategies you can use throughout the entire holiday season:
The Micro-Moment Campaign
Target an exact micro-moment with 48-72 hour offers. Don’t always try to cover the entire month - go after hyper-specific holiday micro-moments when the need for your product or service is highest and the audience is most willing to spend. Think first payday of December, when people have money that’s burning a hole in their pocket, and that 72-hour period before Christmas where your procrastinators are willing to spend just about anything to get what they need. For these highly specific times, consider creating a limited-time offer with a promo that lasts only 2-3 days to capture as many sales as possible.
Gift Guides with Personality
Another task that many brands are missing the mark on is creating gift guides. By now, almost every brand has published one of the “Top 10 Gifts under $50” type lists. They can be painfully generic, boring to read, and it can feel almost impossible to differentiate yourself. Rather than using the same template as everyone else, make gift guides more strategic and powerful by splitting them into persona-based segments or pricing segments. Choose a section you serve exceptionally well, make it specific, give it a personality that aligns with your brand, and go all in.
Give-to-Gain UGC Campaigns
Set up a giveaway tied to a clear UGC ask that feels native to your brand and fun for your audience. Try something like “show us your 10-second ritual before you switch off your laptop for the holidays” - or - “share your 5 top tips for post-vacay self care” in exchange for a service bundle. Prioritize experiences or vouchers for winners instead of a mystery “free product” so it's clear that it's a reward and not a transactional exchange.
Re-think your Visual Systems
Every holiday season, marketers everywhere have the holiday season version of a quarter-life crisis in their visual systems. They put away their brand-approved elements and colors and use cheap stock site gradients and bad, watermarked placeholder images, trying to “spruce it up” into festive cheer. But - that’s conformity - not creativity. You can use seasonal elements and still make it your own. Create your own holiday version of a brand kit (think: your existing brand textures, color palettes, and language, but with some seasonal elements layered in on top). The point is: if your brand aesthetic is bare-minimal and super-modern, don’t throw ugly colored ribbons and shiny snowflake gifs everywhere. Add warm metallics or more organic textures that are both seasonal and feel like they could have come from your brand’s original visual system.
Post-Holiday Retain & Re-Activate
Don’t leave money on the table. Most holiday campaigns end on December 26, but the early days of Q1 are a goldmine. While competitors catch their breath, send “how was it?” surveys, ask for unboxing clips and UGC, and offer loyalty rewards for refills and repeat purchases. This keeps customers engaged after the holidays and provides you with valuable product feedback to inform your Q1 roadmap.
KPIs That Actually Matter
Most vanity metrics become even more useless during the holidays. Focus on what matters:
CTR to product pages (did they click? are they interested?)
Conversion rate on holiday bundles (did they buy?)
ROAS for paid campaigns (is it actually working? profitable?)
Email conversion rate (is your list actually engaged?)
Repeat purchase rate 30-90 days out (did you create customers or just one-time buyers?)
UGC engagement rate (did your audience play?)
CAC specific to holiday marketing campaigns (are you spending on ad channels wisely?)
Accessibility, Ethics & Cultural Fluency
All holiday content must be accessible at all times. This means adding alt text to images and captions to videos, not just for ADA compliance, but also for audience sanity. It also needs to be inclusive and culturally sensitive. Not everyone celebrates Christmas or observes it in the same way, so avoid making assumptions about holidays and localize when necessary. If you serve different markets, your subscribers are likely to experience different holidays and time zones. The brands that do this best plan ahead, recognizing that being ethical and inclusive expands their reach.
Conclusion
Smart holiday content goes beyond stock photos in ugly sweaters and generic 15% off discounts. Winning brands showcase their unique identity while serving their audiences' actual needs. Holiday content isn't regular posts with snowflake gradients - it's strategic, audience-first work with real business goals. The better approach is to create seasonal campaigns that are on brand, high-converting, and uniquely yours.
Happy Holidays!
The Content Queens
