7 Valentine's Day Ideas That Will Win The Hearts Of Your Fans

Couples in love are not the only ones looking forward to Valentine's Day.

Florists, restaurants, jewelers, e-shops and many other businesses are counting on this holiday to bring their business a significant boost in the first quarter.

To see how significant this day really is, we checked statistics from the National Retail Federation and found out that this holiday brought around $19 billion in sales last year, with average spending of $142 dollars per gift. At this rate Valentine's Day is second only to Christmas so it's quite understandable how no one wants to miss this business opportunity.

According to Facebook research, users in the US start their Valentine's Day planning 1 week in advance, but shopping continues to the last minute with 37% of men and 28% of women still planning on the actual day. More than 50% will use their smartphones and tablets to research gifts or compare prices, while 26.1% plan to shop for Valentine's gifts online. This makes targeting social media platforms and sites an obvious solution to achieve even better results.

If you still have no idea how to communicate your Valentine's Day message, here are few ideas that will help you spread the love on social media:

1. "Feel" the love

Embrace the color scheme of the holiday at the beginning of February so that red and pink can start reminding your fans that Valentine's Day is just around the corner and they should start looking for that perfect gift. Play with hearts, roses, cupids and other icons and give yourself a Valentine's Day facelift on all social media platforms.

Start by downloading free design application Content Creator with dozens of beautiful, love-inspired templates that can help you create special Valentine's Facebook Cover photos or a Twitter Header. Use them to communicate your most important Valentine's Day offer, as that will help your business stand out and show you have something special to offer for the holiday.

2. Talk about love

Create social media posts that will engage your fans in a conversation about their Valentine's memories or plans for that day. For optimal engagement, try to come up with original questions and present them in a fill-in-the-blank format that encourages conversation. If possible, try to get the slightest bit of personal information from fans as it could help you draw attention to your Valentine's Day offering.

If you want to save time but maintain visual harmony, develop layout templates for this type of post using the Content Creator app. It will help everything look more professional and polished. For example, if you want to have several Question Posts, use simple backgrounds and script fonts on all of them, as that will help your fans, during the Valentine's week, to spot and recognize your posts easily. Make sure that you place your logo on designed posts, as that will additionally increase your brand recognition and let fans know who is asking the question.

3. Have fun with "love"

Remember that this holiday does not just celebrate romantic love but also love for friends, family, pets, nature or even yourself. So why not have a "Love a deal?" sale and attract attention to your business during Valentine's Day week, even if you have nothing romantic to offer.

If you are designing a banner ad to promote this type of sale, remember to create an order in the way you arrange your text. Greater size indicates greater importance so use one size for the main copy and another for additional copy or call to action. As your text should be adapted for smaller mobile screens, do NOT use extremely thin or overly embellished fonts but simple sans-serif fonts that are easy to read.

Always have a clear call to action that is positioned at the end of the message or at the bottom of the ad. Don't forget to follow through, as the ad must be linked to a landing page that looks and feels like your ad.

4. Help the ones that you love

Telling people to buy your product may look a bit pushy, but including your product in a gift guide that helps people with inspiration is a much smoother way to showcase your Valentine's offer.

Try to stand out by being specific with your gift guide, so create a list for targeted audiences (for example "for men who like to look posh" or "for women who like to explore the world") or a specific price point. Since titles of these gift guides can be lengthy, try to choose a photo with a lot of empty space.

In this way you will avoid clutter and communicate your message clearly. Start by uploading the photo to Content Creator where you can crop it, adjust brightness or contrast with available filters and then choose one of the available Valentine's templates to communicate the title of your gift list.

Make sure you preserve the level of visual interest and not place text over some important part of an image, but rather follow a natural flow and make the best out of the available space.

5. Mingle with the singles

If you have a bar or a club there's no reason why you shouldn't use this opportunity to celebrate the ones that are not in a relationship.

Throw a fun mixer for singles and celebrate the whole "Cupid is Stupid" idea in style. If you want to design a social media invitation, remember to limit the number of fonts to two or maximum three. Chosen carefully they will not only separate certain parts of your text but will actually compliment each other.

If you are using Content Creator try pairing decorative fonts such as Bilbo, Dynalight or Grand Hotel with serif fonts such as Trabajo, Stanislav or Libertinage. Decorative fonts are fun and effective but you should use them mostly when their strong personality helps communicate a casual and relaxed tone of message.

6. Give from your heart

Valentine shoppers are looking for products that will make a perfect gift, so showcase your on-trend products and combine them with an offer that will engage visitors and peak their interest.

The attention of indecisive shoppers can be captured with information about your returns and refund policies while your coupons, discount and sales will push them over the edge to become customers. To bring attention to the massage place your text on a background that will not be too distracting and accentuate your design with Sale templates you can find in the Content Creator app.

Be sure that the message is concise and easy-to-digest so that it can be understood in a matter of seconds. If you need to additionally reinforce your brand, place your logo in the corner of the photo where it will make a quiet but consistent statement without being too distracting.

7. Send your Valentine's wishes

Acknowledging Valentine's Day is a way to make your business more personal. You can keep it short and sweet with a simple "Happy Valentine" or you can extend your message to include thoughts about love or relationships.

If you want to stand out from the crowd avoid having dominantly red or pink colors in your post but choose a darker background that will make your design stand out.

How about you, what are you planning to do this Valentine's Day on social media? Do you believe that social media and Valentine's Day are a match made in heaven? Let us know in the comments below!

Guest Author: Aida Gadzo is a Social Media Strategist at contentcreatorapp.com. She helps small and medium businesses master the "what", "why" and "how" of producing and delivering engaging digital and social media content that will activate audiences and drive sales.

Disclaimer: This is a sponsored post for Content Creator.

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