Christmas giveaway ideas for your small business

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

Christmas is right around the corner, and if you want to promote your business, connect with customers and ramp up Christmas shopping, one of the best things you can do is to host a giveaway. Christmas giveaways are a great way to get your customers into the spirit of the season — and encourage them to shop with your small business for all their festive needs. Plus, a great giveaway can help keep your small business top of mind even after the festive season is over.

But what kind of giveaway is the right move for your business this Christmas? Let’s take a look at 6 Christmas giveaway ideas that will help you spread cheer and drive plenty of Christmas sales in the process:

1. Give a free gift with every Christmas purchase.

During the festive season, shoppers are out searching for the perfect gift for everyone on their list (’tis the season of giving, after all!).

But because they’re so focused on getting Christmas gifts, most people aren’t shopping for themselves in December. So, why not show your customers that they’re on *your* Christmas list? Offer them a gift they can enjoy with their purchase — you’ll be treating your customers during a time when they’re unlikely to treat themselves.

A gift with purchase is not only a great way to thank your customers for shopping with you during the festive season, but it also gives them an incentive to shop with your business. And if they don’t want to keep the gift for themselves, they can use it as a stocking filler for someone else!

2. Run a Christmas-themed BOGOF offer.

A Christmas-themed buy one, get one free offer (often called ‘BOGOF’) is another great way to incentivise your customers to do their Christmas shopping with your business. And as an added bonus, an offer like this can be a great way to get rid of excess inventory. Maybe you have an item that’s not selling as well as you expected and you want to get it off the shelves before the new year — you could offer it as a BOGOF deal during Christmas.

3. Run a ‘12 Days of Christmas’ promotion.

A 12 Days of Christmas theme is a win-win for you and your customers. You get to stretch out all the fun and business exposure of a Christmas giveaway for a full 12 days, while your customers get more chances to cash in on your giveaway; instead of one opportunity to receive a Christmas gift or win a prize, they get 12!

There are plenty of 12 Days of Christmas giveaway ideas you could run with. You might give away a different piece of branded merchandise to shoppers each day of the promotion — a tote bag on day 1, a hat on day 2, a water bottle on day 3, etc. Or, you could raffle off a larger prize or gift card each day.

Another way to build excitement for your giveaway is to keep each day’s promotion a secret. Unveiling the details of your 12 Days of Christmas promotion in real-time will create a sense of anticipation with your customers. They’ll be sure to tune into your social media channels, visit your business website or stop by your brick-and-mortar location each day to find out what giveaway or promotion you’re running — and this increased level of engagement can lead to increased sales.

4. Host a giveaway on social media.

Social media is a great place to advertise your Christmas giveaways. But if you’re strategic about your delivery, a giveaway can also be a great way to build your social media following — and increase your audience before the new year.

Choose a high-value item you want to make the centre of your Christmas giveaway — maybe a gift basket of your best-selling products or a shopping spree at your retail location. Then, host the giveaway on your social media platforms — and use the giveaway to encourage social sharing. For example, let’s say you’re hosting your Christmas giveaway on Instagram. You could let your followers know that, for every person they tag in the comments, they’ll get an entry to win the big prize. This can act as an incentive to tag their friends — and the more friends they tag, the more your social media following grows.

5. Create a Christmas giveaway competition.

As the name implies, you could just give something away for your Christmas giveaway. But you could also make your customers work for it — and turn your Christmas giveaway into a Christmas giveaway *competition*.

While many December giveaways choose a winner at random or give a small prize to every customer, a Christmas giveaway competition adds an extra element of fun and creativity — both for you and your customers.

The theme of your competition can take whatever form you’d like. You could ask your customers to rewrite their favourite Christmas song with your business as the theme, or you might have a competition to see who can write the most original caption for one of your company’s Christmas Facebook photos. Does your business serve a lot of families and children? Hold a festive colouring competition for the kids. As long as the competition is fun and themed around Christmas, it’ll drive engagement with your business throughout the festive season (and, hopefully, drive sales right along with it).

6. Partner with another local business for a Christmas giveaway.

Partnering with another local business is another great way to spread the Christmas cheer as far as possible this festive season. Since both you and your partner business will be advertising your Christmas giveaway, you each get exposure to the other person’s audience — which can introduce your business to new people and increase your customer base.

Look for other businesses in your community that would make sense to partner with for a giveaway. Do you own a coffee shop? Partner with a local chocolatier to put together a gift basket for Christmas morning, filled with a selection of coffee and chocolate. Or let’s say you own a yoga studio. You might launch a ‘New Year, New You’ giveaway and partner with other local wellness businesses to create a resolution-inspired giveaway package.

Partnering with another local business can add more value to your Christmas giveaway and help you get in front of more potential customers. It’s a Christmas win-win.