13 Halloween Marketing Ideas That Are So Good, They're Scary

Before the leaves have even started to fall, shoppers and businesses are already gearing up for the spookiest season of the year. Halloween isn’t just for kids and costume parties, it’s a frighteningly good opportunity for businesses to interact with their communities, reach their target audiences, and boost their brand awareness. 

When should I start marketing for Halloween? To maximize your marketing efforts during the Halloween season, it’s best to start teasing your Autumn sales and Halloween promotions in September. We start a shift from summer to fall promotions in late August right after kids go back to school. When the pumpkin spice lattes hit the coffee shops, it's time for fall, and this year they’re scheduled to return the last week of August.

Planning your Halloween Marketing Campaigns

Americans love Halloween and there’s data to prove it. The National Retail Foundation (opens in a new window) has seen record spending for Halloween since 2020, outperforming even pre-pandemic numbers. From small businesses in town to large corporations, organizations have a chance to increase sales as consumers start buying candy, costumes, and spooky decor to get into the Halloween spirit.

How can companies use Halloween to their advantage? With a well-planned Halloween marketing campaign, you can use spooky themes and products related to the ghoulish holiday to playfully resonate and connect with your audience.  Our 4AlllPromos marketing experts sat down to create this wickedly clever Halloween marketing ideas list to help you create a killer campaign.  

1. Participate in Neighborhood or Chamber of Commerce Trick-or-Treating

Businesses with a brick-and-mortar location can take advantage of community events during the Halloween holiday season. Many towns have a trick-or-treat walk for children to walk from business to business collecting candy and fun promotional giveaways. Join your local chamber of commerce’s trick-or-treat event to connect with the community. Hand out business cards or Halloween promotional items like small toys and glow sticks. This is a great way to spread brand awareness and meet the people who live close enough to shop in-store.

2. Host a Pumpkin Carving Contest or Giveaway

Nothing says we’re in the middle of the fall season like pumpkins! Invite members of your community and prospective clients to a pumpkin giveaway or pumpkin carving contest. You can run an in-person carve-off, or add your logo to pumpkin carving knives and pumpkin scoopers to encourage people to carve pumpkins at home and post later on social media platforms. 

They’ll have a great time thanks to your business and you can have people vote by liking jack-o-lanterns that feature a custom hashtag. 

3. Hand Out Branded Halloween Bags

The days of using a pillowcase to run around town collecting candy are over. Get custom trick-or-treat bags to hand out at events leading up to Halloween. Nearly every organization can benefit from the brand awareness promotional Halloween bags have to offer. 

We have Halloween-inspired designs that kids will take all around town to collect their candy and Halloween treats. Each house they stop at will see your logo giving you repeated brand exposure all night long. 

Another Halloween bag campaign idea is to fill the bags with candy and Halloween goodies to spread goodwill. When parents inspect the Halloween treats they’ll see your brand and learn about your business. 

4. Make Limited Edition Halloween-themed Products & Branded Merchandise

From 6-foot-tall Halloween decorations to limited-time pumpkin-spiced lattes, Halloween-themed products will fly off the shelves. Create a buzz by stocking special edition branded merchandise and spooky season products with limited-time offers. This creates a sense of urgency and FOMO, making your customer base act fast for the Halloween specials. 

What are some creative ways to engage customers with Halloween giveaways? Give your customers something they’ll use that fits the theme of All Hallow’s Eve. This could be anything from Halloween-inspired apparel, light-up products for Halloween parties, or spooky stress relievers to keep on their desks at work.

5. Create Halloween Discount Landing Pages for Ecommerce

Make sure customers can find your Halloween deals with a web page dedicated to your offer discounts. A Halloween-specific landing page that features special discounts and promo codes will make the experience better for returning and new customers. Use Halloween colors and graphics of ghouls, goblins, skeletons, and zombies.

Remember to have a banner or link to your landing page from the home page to direct traffic to your Halloween sale. You can add a countdown clock to let shoppers know when the sale starts and ends. 

6. Boost Social Media Campaigns with Spooky User Generated Content

From costume contests to Halloween recipes, you can use October to boost engagement on your social media channels. Halloween provides the perfect time to gather user-generated content. You can run online costume contests or polls for costume ideas, or encourage your customers to share their Halloween experiences using your products.

User-generated content can be a powerful tool to build brand awareness and increase your social proof. A fun promotional idea during the witching hour is to have followers try a scavenger hunt, tagging your business in stories when they find items. This lets people from all over find similar items on the list and play from any location, all while spreading your handle to their audiences. You can send winners a gift card or branded company swag as a prize.

What should I post on social media for Halloween? On the day of Halloween, you can make social media posts that include photos of your employees, pets, or (with permission) kids in their Halloween costumes. If you’re having a sale, be sure to remind your customers one more time too.

7. Give Branded Candy to Trick-or-Treaters

If the community your business is in has a trick-or-treat event or a Halloween parade, you can stand out and spread awareness of your business with promotional fun-sized candy. For online stores, add a branded bag of candy with a little message telling the customer it was a “treat” to pack their orders. Any leftover candy after Halloween can be given to guests and visitors when they come to your office. 

8. Host a Trunk-or-Treat Halloween Event

Take the initiative to invite the city to come to you when you host a trunk-or-treat event in your parking lot. Trunk-or-treats are drive-through trick-or-treating events that gained popularity during the pandemic. Decorate your car trunks with spooky Halloween decorations and hand out Halloween treats and promotional products. This is a great way to engage with families and create a memorable experience.

9. Send Halloween Email Campaigns

Don’t underestimate the power of email marketing during Halloween. Craft Halloween email campaigns with catchy subject lines, festive templates, and exclusive Halloween deals. Highlight any of your limited-time Halloween products and encourage recipients to act fast before the deals vanish.

When should I start Halloween marketing campaigns? You should start letting customers know about any Halloween merch or swag coming for the season as soon as late August. If you plan to have a sale closer to Halloween, you can start your campaign later in September. Emails with coupon codes can be sent the week of Halloween to give customers one last shot to take advantage of discounts. 

10. Use Interactive Pop-Ups for Trick-or-Treat Promotions

When users land on your homepage during October, you can fire a pop-up with an interactive trick-or-treat game. Ask a user if they want a trick or a treat, and have a result for each selection. Promo codes or free shipping are great offers to entice them to make a purchase, and your pop-up can direct them straight to the Halloween sales landing page.

11. Run Halloween Quizzes and Polls to Build Email Lists

You can also use Halloween to build your email list or social media following with quizzes and polls. People feel very passionate about celebrating Halloween, putting as much effort into decorating houses and having parties as they would during Christmas. This means they also have strong opinions about which movies are best for the season, what recipes are a must, and which types of Halloween costumes are best. You can use this to your advantage by having your audience engage in polls or quizzes, giving them the results in exchange for their email addresses.  

The information you collect about your audience can then be used to segment and send more personalized offers in the future. 

12. Distribute Halloween Safety Tips & Brochures

Halloween is a fun holiday for children and adults, but it does come with safety concerns. From the dark nights to people trying to play tricks instead of getting treats, it’s always good to be cautious. You can hand out Halloween bags that feature safety tips, light-up or reflective candy bags, or even brochures with helpful information. This shows your community you care.

13. Hand Out Halloween Promotional Products

Because Halloween is a holiday that all ages and backgrounds enjoy, your business has the opportunity to connect with people you may not have otherwise reached with Halloween promotional items. We’ve mentioned staples like Halloween candy bags and branded candies, but you can also hand out items like glow sticks, coloring books, and stress relievers in the shape of pumpkins, eyeballs, or skulls. Hand out promotional Halloween items at the end of a haunted house or during a harvest fest parade. Add your logo to balloons and light up candles and drinkware for easy DIY decorations to keep your brand shining during the Halloween party. 

4AllPromos Staff Picks for Halloween Promotional Products

At 4AllPromos we have over a hundred different Halloween promotional items to choose from. What do people buy for Halloween events and celebrations? For parties we see people buy Halloween balloons and candy most often. For events leading up to Halloween, we see our other branded Halloween items getting more attention. We asked our staff what their favorite items have been that they have seen ordered around Halloween time and here’s what they say:

• Shelby says, “The Halloween Cotton Coloring Tote Bag is such a cool idea. It gives kids an opportunity to be creative and let their inner artists shine. You can have a color event and then they get to use the bag for trick-or-treating. Parents get a little keepsake too.”

• Julie picked the LED Pumpkin Bag and the Pumpkin Spinner Wand. “The products that light up give parents like me an easy way to see our kids on Halloween night. It’s the safety aspect for me, but the kids love the glow of the LEDs and the fun spinning pumpkin on the wand. It’s something they’ll keep around and the LED bag can be used over and over again. Any company would be smart to put a logo on one of these products.”

• Sam’s favorite branded Halloween item is the Monster Hand Phone Holder Stress Reliever. “How cool is this product? I don’t know about anyone else, but when I’m working at my desk I’m constantly misplacing my phone or accidentally covering it with papers. This gives me a place to put it, plus it’s spooky-themed and doubles as a stress squeezie after a tough meeting. For me, this item might be Halloween-themed, but it would be on my desk year round.”

Start Planning for Halloween promotions and Get Spooktacular Sales

Halloween is an excellent opportunity to get creative with your marketing strategy. Leverage the love for the spooky season with Halloween-themed products, interactive campaigns, and timely promotions to increase your brand's visibility and drive sales. 

Whether you're handing out branded candy, hosting a Halloween event, or launching an email campaign, our strategies can help your business stand out and make the most of this frighteningly fun time of year. Start planning your Halloween marketing efforts today to ensure a fang-tastically successful holiday! Browse our staff's favorite products or any of our other Halloween promotional items to start your brand awareness campaign this year. 

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