How Halloween Marketing Changes Based on Client Persona

For some, Halloween is about horror and gore. For others, it's about drawing inspiration from autumn and family values. A younger audience might expect more youthful Halloween depictions or communications in their marketing, with references to gore and horror. Contemporary clients may also expect Halloween marketing to align with pop culture or be based heavily on old horror movies or shows like Sabrina The Teenage Witch, Dark Shadows, or Nightmare on Elms Street. An older clientele, however, might expect to see more reference to autumn with the odd pumpkin here and there than skulls, and more emphasis on family, than movies and parties.  

 The Younger/More Contemporary Demographic 

 For younger generations and those that follow contemporary ways of thinking about Halloween, marketing can play on the fact that there will be parties and dressing up as a way for clients to express themselves. 

 1. Creating season-specific lines with brightly coloured branding 

This technique is easy for certain sectors like make-up and cosmetics because these companies often release specific lines around these seasons. As make-up is all about expressing yourself, Halloween cosmetic lines often exaggerate classical horror looks. Though these are not specific to the younger generation, as make-up is universal, they tap into more contemporary ways of viewing autumn and Halloween more generally. 

 For their 2016 Halloween collection, MAC Cosmetics put together a make-up line that uses the theme of 'extraterrestrial' and 'ethereal to get clients in the mood for the season. MAC did not connect this line to any reference from pop culture, which makes it even more effective. Unlike creating a line inspired by a specific movie, a line with a theme that your business has come up with allows you to be more creative and set the tone for what your business wants Halloween to be. It gives you authority for the season and brings clients to you- and you alone – to fulfil their need to follow your theme. 

Having your own line based on your own theme also allows you to create other specialised content to promote it, which is what MAC's Halloween marketing did. 

They created a series of short promotional videos to promote the line on their landing page. 

As well as make-up tutorials available on YouTube to teach people how to create each look in the line using their products. 

2. Social media colours and images 

Social media is the perfect spot when it comes to creating a Halloween theme for your business. While it may not always be ideal (or easy) to alter your entire website to suit every season, your Instagram page can function as an ever-changing gallery that shifts with your business. 

During the colder months and Halloween, many companies create Halloween galleries on their Instagram to get their clients in the mood for the season before visiting their physical locations. It's also a great way to draw attention to your staple products that may not be getting a rebrand in-store but can take on a new spin to attract new clients through social media. 

For their Halloween marketing last year, Starbucks took their classical strawberry Frappuccino and re-vamped it for Halloween by using the strawberry red colour to associate it with vampires and blood in typical pop-culture Halloween fashion.    

3. Influencer marketing 

As Halloween is a time of parties and high-profile events, collaborating with equally high-profile influencers is a great way to create a buzz around your brand. Make-up brands like MAC cosmetics often create make up tutorials with prominent make-up artists for clients to copy, share, comment on to put their brand in the spotlight. This is what MAC's Halloween marketing campaign did in 2013 when they collaborated with famous special effects make-up artist Rick Baker.  

Make-up brands do this often as they are one of the few types of businesses that do best during this time. They are part of Halloween's 'partying-trick or treating aspect, typically aimed at a younger demographic. 

4. Creating links with and collaborating with popular 'horror' films 

The younger or more contemporary demographic often associate Halloween with popular movies. To that effect pairing your brand with classical films is an easy way to create a limited, iconic line that clients will line up to get because of their love of the films. 

Revolutions Make-up brand has created a line in collaboration with two famous Halloween and Christmas movies, The Corpse's Bride, and The Nightmare After Christmas, to celebrate the season. 

The line uses brighter colours than their usual pallets and using the iconic and eye-catching imagery from the movies themselves to create a novelty, limited collection line that customers can flock to and have as a token of their 2021 Halloween. 

5. Language 

Halloween has a vernacular. Use that vernacular in your copy to bring your campaign to the forefront when clients search for Halloween related topics. Youthful Halloween marketing uses terms often related to parties, trick or treating and movies with plenty of references to 'spooks', 'boo' with a mix of popular social media language to speak directly to your demographic like the copy used in Pretty Little Thing's communications about their Halloween collection last year. 

All of this aims to help clients see the companies as up-to-date authority figures in their field regarding self-assertion and fun. 

The Older/ More Traditional Demographic 

For older generations, or people more concerned with traditional ideas about Halloween, this is a time for reflection, harvesting, and paying tribute to nature. 

1. Language 

Unlike the more contemporary demographic language used by brands to appeal to traditionalists is often more conservative and more concerned with getting clients the feel of the cosy harvest season., as we mentioned in our previous post, "Autumn Marketing: What Businesses Should Highlight." 

Every year The Body Shop releases their Vanilla Pumpkin range to prepare for the autumn/ Halloween season. The language they use in their message has a more subdued tone of excitement to suggest relaxation instead of a fright night. 

2. Branding and colours 

Brands catering to these audiences are less likely to use stark black reds and greens. In their Halloween marketing, they are more likely to stick to classical autumns colours and themes like oranges and browns. 

Though The Body Shop's 2020 Vanilla Pumpkin range was for Halloween, it is easy to think it was solely for autumn. Even though the packaging uses skulls and ghosts, the design of the skulls is not prominent. Rather they blend in with the other autumn colours and gives the branding a more subdued autumnal look. 

For more traditional clients, especially clients with children, Halloween is not for them but for their kids. Using images and videos of smiling children is a great Halloween marketing tool to help the older clients get excited about Halloween on behalf of those they are going to help celebrate it. An example of this can is in the Halloween lines released by John Lewis. Unlike Pretty Little Thing, brands like John Lewis are marketing to an older or more traditional demographic.  

As a result, the bulk of their marketing around Halloween appeals to this demographic's need to make their kids happy rather than inspire the adults into dressing up and parting for themselves. 

 4. Sparse social media Halloween content 

While social media can be the easiest way to present your business's overall marketing campaign on a single page, companies targeting older audiences often won't do this because they understand that their clientele doesn't need it. 

 M & S and John Lewis are both companies that prove this. Both companies almost don't touch on Halloween marketing on their Instagram pages and jump straight to Christmas. 

The contrast between contemporary Halloween marketing and traditional marketing is especially clear when we look at the difference between two famous coffee shop chains. In comparison to the lighter, more fun tone of Starbucks, Caffe Nero is a coffee brand noted for being more conservative with older clientele who often like just a straightforward coffee. As a result, Caffe Nero's 2020 social media Halloween campaign consisted of a single post appealing directly to parents. 

Halloween is a time of the year that everyone looks forward to. However, different people and different population segments have different associations with this event. The younger clientele, or those interested in pop culture and contemporary interpretations of Halloween, may want bold, vibrant marketing related to popular horror cinema. Marketing for this clientele can reflect the colours and language used in these films and on the sites that they frequent, such as Instagram. 

The older or more traditional clients may be more concerned with the family aspect. Therefore, for these clients, reiterating the aspects of family and autumn are important. Halloween may not be for them but for their children, and your Halloween marketing campaign is there to help them give their children the best Halloween experience possible.  

In knowing these specifics about your clientele, companies can execute their marketing techniques well because they know what clients expect from their brand and brands can give them exactly what they want and need to see.