Last-minute Marketing Tips and Trends for Halloween 2021

Written by Juliette Maumelat

October 6, 2021

We finally entered October which means that Halloween is just around the corner! Not so surprisingly, this seasonal event is a pretty important opportunity for retailers both online and offline every year. In 2020, many places across the globe were still in lockdown so fewer people fully enjoyed the spooky season. But this year, Halloween spendings and marketing are back on, gearing up to be a 10 billion dollars retail event.

What are the trends?

We’ve observed that people start their Halloween planning super early. They usually look for inspiration as of May or June and make their shopping later on, in September or October. It’s a quite massive phenomena on social media. Indeed, a great Halloween costume will get you a good number of likes, comments, and shares, so creativity is really part of the business! Social platforms also play a key role in how Gen Z and millennials find their ideas for a costume, makeup, decoration, or even food. Every year has its new theme, new trends.

“More than 30% of Halloween shoppers will source inspiration from online searches, compared to the 26% that will go in-store to find ideas.” National Retail Federation

According to the National Retail Federation, around 20% of adults turn to Facebook for ideas and shopping, around 19% on YouTube and Pinterest, and 16% on Instagram. However, the best app to stay on top of the latest trends for Halloween remains Pinterest. The platform published an overview ranking all the top search trends that people are looking for. Thanks to their internal database, Pinterest can easily determine what are going to be the trends of the year in terms of costume, makeup, decoration, and food menu.

Searches containing “Halloween inspiration” were 3X greater in August this year versus last. Pinners started to plan much earlier and searches containing “Halloween” started rising as early as the second week of May (vs fourth week of May last year) and they increased 3.5X as fast compared to the same time last year. This year’s Halloween theme is all about aesthetic fantasies expressed in metallics and vivid shades. […] Another major theme we will see for Halloween decorations this year is a throwback style. “Retro Halloween aesthetic” is the top trending term related to Halloween– searches have increased by 76x” Pinterest Newsroom

Influencer marketing and Halloween?

We believe that it’s really important for marketers to follow trends, and thus to create Halloween content on social media even if the product offering is not related. And, what could be more relevant and efficient than collaborating directly with content creators? Especially that, during this time of the year, influencers are not yet super busy with partnerships. It is the perfect opportunity, before Christmas, to work their top of mind and brand engagement. They can team up with nano and micro-influencers to spread the word offline & online. Also with professionals, cosmetic brands can leverage makeup artists to create Halloween looks. In 2018, L’Oréal even created a specific Halloween board on Pinterest with multiple makeup tutorials done with their products.

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