To the cynic, Valentine’s Day is a gimmick created by card companies to cash in on cupid and guilt-trip the romantically-involved consumers out there. But it is a hugely successful seasonal sales period nonetheless. It represents a great opportunity for retail marketers to connect with their coupled customers – and even the single ones!

Enchant has lovingly compiled 7 nuggets of Valentine’s marketing inspiration, including numerous great Valentine’s Day marketing campaign examples. Take a look and get inspired:

Spice up your subject lines

It’s important for your email marketing subject lines to stand out during seasonal opportunities like Valentine’s Day. Including relevant keywords is crucial, but generic Valentine’s references won’t encourage subscribers to open your emails. Be playful, be innovative and hook subscribers by leveraging emotions and serving their needs during this period.

Here are a few examples of playful and click-worthy seasonal subject lines:

• Let's play cupid - Etsy
• Flirt with flavours this Valentine's Day - Ask Italian
• Hey, hot stuff! - Las Iguanas

Feel the love with emojis

When you’re creating seasonal content or promoting festive campaigns, you need to utilise the engagement power of emojis. The range of easily available emojis for different occasions means there is always plenty of scope for using them in your email subject lines or social media posts. Emojis are eye-catching, instantly engaging and boost the impact of your message.

Check out the following examples of Valentine's Day emojis in email subject lines:

Perk customer interest with incentives

There is no better way to encourage customers to convert during seasonal marketing opportunities than incentivising them. It is a period when consumers are in buying mode – if they are romantical inclined – but they need to be convinced that you have what they need and incentives are the perfect nudge tactic. Perk customer interest with a seasonal offering, visually-appealing content and a loyalty reward or customer discount that seals the deal. This email from Redbubble evokes urgency with the limited-time express shipping for Valentine’s:

The following tweet from online drinks retailer 31Dover gives Twitter users an incentive to follow the account and retweet the post for a chance to win a Valentine’ Day gift set:

Make Valentine’s content visually appealing

Make Valentine’s content visually appealing Valentine’s is the ideal time for delivering visual impact – especially in retail and particularly if your products are aesthetically pleasing. Fashion brands, restaurateurs and high-end jewellery stores are all in prime position for exciting customers with potential gifts, seasonal offers and must-have products for Valentine’s Day. Make sure your social content sings and you make sure your web pages wow your visitors.

Here is Charlotte Tilbury's bold and colourful homepage during the Valentine’s period: 

Here are some tasty-looking visuals from an ASK marketing email seeking to tantalise its subscribers:

And Las Iguanas spicing things up for their email subscribers:

Pull on the heartstrings with personalisation

Whether it’s personalised recommendations tailored to customer preferences and historical data or inserting personalisation in email subject lines and template copy, Valentine’s is a seasonal opportunity for marketers to deliver the personal touch to their customers. Here is a personalised Valentine’s email from Odeon below:

Be inclusive to the unlucky in love

Valentine’s Day is not for everyone. Some people don’t buy into the concept and some find it an unwanted reminder of not having a partner. But the event doesn’t have to be all about those who are lucky in love, it can be about finding love. Brands can cater for this too, offering something of interest to customers looking to find their match or engage with other single people.

Recent research from Bing revealed that single men in the US, on average, spend $71 and single women spend $40 on Valentine’s Day. So don’t just concentrate on couples! Look at this innovative Instagram post from Beer Hawk: