If you have a seasonal business, you know how important it is to capitalize on that short timeframe every year.
When your business depends on visitors, it’s important to get ahead of the season so you can market to people while they’re still planning their trips, rather than after they’ve already arrived and finalized their itinerary.
A seasonal marketing strategy uses customer data from the previous year to make informed decisions about who to market to and when. It’s how Woods MarCom has helped several local Skagit Valley businesses (and local businesses across the country!) make the most of their short seasons, which account for a significant share of annual revenue.
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Start Marketing Before the Season Begins
Seasonal businesses need to think several months ahead. If you wait until ticket sales open or tourists show up at your door to market yourself, you’re too late and are missing out on revenue.
Think about when people typically start planning their trips and booking activities. They may book flights and hotels 4-6 months in advance and activities 1-2 months ahead of time.
Your job is to begin marketing before that window. Build content, ads, social media campaigns, and partnerships around the upcoming season.
The goal is to be visible while people are researching and making plans, not when the season actually starts.
Think About Where Your Visitors Are Coming From
Your audience isn’t necessarily just the people who live in your destination. In fact, most of your visitors are probably tourists, whether they’re coming from a few towns away or across the country.
Look at the cities, states, or regions your visitors are traveling from. This can help you understand your audience and identify geographic markets worth targeting.
For example, if a large portion of your visitors come from Texas, your seasonal marketing strategy could specifically speak to Texans planning a trip to your destination.
Market to People Where They Are
Once you know where visitors are coming from, use that information to inform your seasonal marketing.
You could try:
- Location-based advertising
- Social media targeting
- Partnerships
- Content geared toward travelers from those areas
Think about what someone needs to know before they arrive. This includes information about your business AND general trip planning.
About your business, they probably need to know:
- Where you’re located
- Your hours
- When ticket sales open
- How much tickets are
- How to buy tickets online
- What the experience will be like
- What they can and cannot bring with them
For trip planning, you might provide information such as:
- What to do in the area
- Places to stay and eat
- When to visit
- What the weather will be like that time of year
- How your business fits into their itinerary
13 Ways to Reduce Friction
Customers love it when businesses provide everything they need to know (and more) before they arrive. But it’s frustrating when they have a question and can’t find the answer.
Friction comes when getting information becomes difficult.
- People can’t find what they need to know before visiting.
- It’s impossible to find you online (i.e., you don’t have a Google Business Listing or website)
- The response time after submitting an inquiry is slow.
- Or you don’t have a way to contact you at all…
All of this leads people to find another business that offers a better experience before they even arrive.
To reduce friction:
- Make your next step obvious
- Simplify your navigation
- Make important information easy to find
- Use clear calls to action
- Shorten your forms
- Reduce unnecessary clicks
- Make your website mobile-friendly
- Answer common questions upfront
- Make pricing easy to understand
- Streamline the booking process
- Make contact information easy to find
- Set clear expectations about the event
- Remove outdated or unnecessary website content
Reduce friction any way you can, and you’ll get more customers because you make it easy for them to make a buying decision.
And, not to mention, a simple online process makes things easier for you, too, because you aren’t answering the same questions over email or phone all the time!
Use the End of the Season to Study Your Data
Seasonal events can be a ton of work, and when it’s over, you just want to relax and enjoy some downtime.
But don’t let the season end without looking at where your customers actually came from.
Review:
- Customer data
- Website analytics
- Paid ads results
- Booking information
- Other available sources to identify trends
You might discover that your biggest audience came from somewhere you weren’t actively marketing to. Your actual customer data can challenge your assumptions about who your audience is and inform your seasonal marketing strategy for next year.
Your Ticket Data Isn’t the Only Data That Matters
If you sell tickets or take bookings, it’s easy to focus only on sales numbers. But information like ZIP codes can be incredibly valuable for planning your next season.
Look at geographic patterns in your customer base and compare them year over year. Even if you don’t have extensive customer information, whatever geographic data you can collect can help inform future seasonal marketing campaigns.
Turn This Year’s Visitors Into Next Year’s Seasonal Marketing Strategy
Use what you learned during the current season to make smarter decisions before the next one begins.
- Identify your strongest geographic markets.
- Consider increasing advertising or content efforts in areas that consistently drive visitors to your site.
- Look for unexpected markets that could be worth testing.
Create a list of insights to carry into next year’s planning, rather than starting from scratch. Your future self will thank you when it’s easier to start marketing next year.
Don’t Forget About Changing Tourism Trends
Where visitors come from can change over time. New flights, events, attractions, economic shifts, or travel trends can influence your audience.
Continue monitoring your data rather than assuming last year’s visitor patterns will always apply. Use each season as an opportunity to refine your seasonal marketing strategy.
Let Your Visitors Tell You Where to Market Next
Seasonal marketing is an opportunity to learn from last year’s data and put it to use. That’s exactly what I did for Tulip Valley Farms. As a business that relies on foot traffic for a significant portion of annual revenue, we made it a priority to maximize our marketing efforts in just one month of the year.
In 2025, they saw a 44% increase in revenue over their 2024 season, and we used that data to inform our 2026 strategy. As a result, they saw another 28% increase in revenue in 2026. We’ll continue to use each year’s data to inform the next year’s seasonal marketing strategy.
The best strategy starts before the season, considers where travelers are coming from, and uses real customer data to improve the next season. The people who visited you this year could give you some of your best clues about where to find next year’s customers.
Do you still need a seasonal marketing strategy for your fast-approaching peak season? I can help you put together a plan that makes the most of the season that means so much for your business.
