This fall, are you considering launching Singles’ Day marketing campaigns? If not, it might be time to rethink your strategy. Singles’ Day, originating in Asia over a decade ago, has become one of the most significant shopping holidays globally, and it’s quickly gaining traction in the Western world. Numerous companies, both large and small, have successfully tapped into this Double 11 holiday.
But what exactly is Singles’ Day, and where did it originate? What strategies lead to successful Singles’ Day marketing campaigns?
In this article, we’ll explore the origins of Singles’ Day, discuss why it’s a compelling fall marketing idea that will set your brand apart from the competition, and provide numerous examples of interactive Singles’ Day marketing campaigns you can implement.
What is Singles’ Day?
Singles’ Day is an unofficial shopping holiday celebrated on November 11th. It started in 2009 in China. It is also known as Double 11 or, in Chinese, 双11.
Originally, the holiday was called Bachelors’ Day and was celebrated for the first time in 1993. Back then, it was not the shopping holiday we know today. It was a festival organized by four university students to celebrate celibacy, hence, why it was called Bachelors’ Day. The idea to celebrate celibacy by organizing parties, blind date events, and other activities spread around the other universities and later on around the entire country. Soon, not only single men celebrated the holiday but people from both genders.
In 2009, Alibaba’s CEO Daniel Zhang decided to use Singles’ Day as a 24-hour shopping holiday festival. The festival includes many amazing online deals and discounts, but also a large event the night before the shopping day starts where famous pop stars such as Taylor Swift and Katty Perry perform. While we may think that using a holiday such as Singles’ Day to link your shopping holiday to was an uncommon idea from CEO Daniel Zhang, a little bit of Asian marketing culture can explain his reasoning quite well. In Asia, it is common to have discounts and promotions on double-digit days, such as 1.1 (January 1st), 2.2 (February 2nd), and 11.11 (November 11th). Hence why we also call the Holiday Double 11.
Actually, Alibaba Group went as far as putting a trademark on the term Double 11, and they threatened their competitors using this term in commercials of legal actions. In 2020, Alibaba decided to stretch the shopping day into an 11-day festival starting on November 1st and ending on November 11th.
Why is Singles’ Day important for marketers?
You might initially dismiss Singles’ Day as an unofficial holiday celebrated primarily in China, but its influence and reach are globally significant. The holiday has not only spread across many Asian countries but is also increasingly recognized in the Western world. For instance, in 2016, Swedish electronics retailer Elgiganten launched its first Singles’ Day campaign in Norway, achieving remarkable success. Due to this success, the following year the campaign expanded across all Nordic countries.
Each year, Singles’ Day grows, attracting more companies, reaching more countries, engaging more shoppers, and generating increasingly substantial revenues. Since its inception in 2009, the holiday has grown an astounding 949,000% over 11 years. By 2020, the event saw participation from over 800 million shoppers worldwide. While it remains a major event in Asia, celebrated in countries like Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, Singapore, Vietnam, and Malaysia, its impact is also growing elsewhere. For example, U.S. businesses generated over five billion dollars in sales on Singles’ Day in 2020—the highest tally outside China. The holiday is also gaining traction in European countries such as Germany, the Netherlands, the UK, France, and Belgium.
In 2019, 90% of Singles’ Day sales came from mobile. So, make sure your Singles’ Day Marketing campaigns are created for mobile first. Plus, make them engaging and interactive, as this is what can help you stand out from the crowd. On Dot.vu, all the Interactive Experiences are responsive and designed as mobile first.
In 2020, even during the pandemic, Singles’ Day generated $70 billion in sales for Alibaba alone, far surpassing the sales totals of Black Friday ($9 billion) and Cyber Monday ($10.84 billion) combined. Given these figures, incorporating Singles’ Day into your marketing strategy is essential, as it has become the world’s largest shopping holiday.
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16 Interactive Experiences that you can use for your Singles’ Day Marketing campaigns
Below, we included examples of fun Singles’ Day Marketing ideas you can do. All the examples included are templates available on Dot.vu or were made using templates. If you like these Singles’ Day Marketing campaign ideas, you could easily use one of these templates to create your own campaigns.
1. Singles’ Day Puzzle
Gamification is one of the best ways to engage website visitors. For Singles’ Day, consider a fun puzzle game where visitors solve a puzzle to receive product recommendations. This game is not only fun and easy to play, but it’s also entertaining and useful.
The Singles’ Day Puzzle makes online shopping more exciting and keeps visitors on your website longer, thus increasing engagement with your brand. Ultimately, the product recommendations at the end can boost your sales during this major shopping holiday.
This is a readily available template, ready for you to customize and turn into your very own Singles’ Day campaign.
2. Spin & Win
This is a simple to implement yet very successful Spin & Win game. Spin & Win games are types of Marketing Games that are highly engaging because customers love to spin the wheel and find out if they will win extra discounts. So, if you are planning to give discounts to your customers for Singles’ Day, why not add a touch of gamification to your Singles’ Day marketing campaign and create a Spin & Win game?
This is a readily available template, ready for you to customize and turn into your very own Singles’ Day campaign.
3. Social Interactive Content
An essential factor to consider is that 11.11 is not yet as famous as Black Friday in the western part of the world. Therefore, until its popularity spreads, you’ll need to give an extra push to your Singles’ Day Marketing campaigns for them to be successful. This means that an essential factor to think about is social sharing. In other words, you will want to encourage participants to share your campaigns with their friends and family to increase the reach of your efforts.
A great idea is to use a Social Interactive Content experience for your Singles’ Day Marketing campaign. This type of Interactive Experience is designed around encouraging social sharing. For example, the idea in the template below is that participants can send a personalized message to their friends for Singles’ Day. In addition, they will also give their friends a chance to win a discount code. These friends will also be able to create their own cards for their friends, continuing this train of social sharing.
This is a readily available template, ready for you to customize and turn into your very own Singles’ Day campaign.
4. Singles’ Day Popup
Do you want to grab your audience’s attention with a stylish popup? Then, this Singles’ Day Popup is great tool for your marketing. Easy to customize, the popup encourages your website visitors to shop on 11.11 by announcing discounts. Moreover, you can use the template to promote specific products by giving discounts on selected items.
This is a readily available template, ready for you to customize and turn into your very own Singles’ Day campaign.
5. Quiz
Another great Singles’ Day Marketing idea could be to create a quiz available only on Singles’ Day. The quiz could be about Singles’ Day itself to drive awareness around the Holiday. But, it could also be around your company or a specific product. Actually, Quizzes are a fantastic idea to promote the launch of a new product. So, if you are planning to reveal a new brand or a new product on Singles’ Day, creating a quiz might be the way to go.
But, remember, Double 11 is about giving deals and discounts, so you might want to give discount codes to customers who participate in your quiz.
As an example, we created a fun quiz about Singles’ Day. Try it below!
This experience was created using one of our customizable templates. We easily turned it into a Singles’ Day campaign. Create a free account to create yours.
6. Hourly Surprises Experience
If you are planning to have specific items on sale for Singles’ Day, you might want to look into creating an Hourly Surprises experience. An Hourly Surprises experience is a type of Interactive Content where you reveal discounts and surprises every hour (or every few hours) all Day during Singles’ Day.
It is a fantastic Singles’ Day Marketing campaign idea because it will build excitement around your deals & discounts. Plus, customers will have to come back to your website throughout the days to see the amazing new deals, hence increasing returning visitor counts and exposure.
This experience was created using one of our customizable templates. We easily turned it into a Singles’ Day campaign. Create a free account to create yours.
7. Discount Card Surprises
While simply using your Singles’ Day campaign to promote your deals and discounts is an excellent strategy, you can also play around with the theme of the Holiday. This means that you can talk directly to singles and offer discounted items suitable for them.
For example, in the customized template below, you can encourage customers to pick a card that fits best their current single situation (e.g., soulmate seeker, ready to mingle, friend-zoned, etc.) Depending on their current single situation, they will receive a specific item at a discounted price. It’s fun, light, and engaging. You should try it out!
This experience was created using one of our customizable templates. We easily turned it into a Singles’ Day campaign. Create a free account to create yours.
8. Single’s Day Roulette
In the previous example, the concept was to create a Singles’ Day campaign that celebrates celibacy. But another idea could be to create Interactive Experiences that celebrate China, as this is a Chinese Holiday. Therefore, you can use elements such as Chinese astrological signs, Chinese architecture, and so on as part of your campaign’s theme.
In the Singles’ Day roulette below, you ask participants to choose one of the 4 available Chinese astrological signs. If the roulette ends on the selected sign, participants can win amazing prizes. If not, they can come back the Day after to try their luck again. To incentivize participation, participants will be able to see tomorrow’s prize. The idea is to use this template from November 1st to November 11th and follow the new Alibaba’s way of celebrating Double 11 for 11 days.
This experience was created using one of our customizable templates. We easily turned it into a Singles’ Day campaign. Create a free account to create yours.
9. Singles’ Day Lucky Draw
Another fun experience to promote your prizes, discounts, and giveaways could be to create a Singles’ Day Lucky Draw. In this example, participants will draw a card to see which prizes they get.
This is an excellent example for your Singles’ Day Marketing campaign if you have multiple prizes such as one Singles’ Day box, 5% discount codes on a specific item, 25% discount codes on everything, etc.
This experience was created using one of our customizable templates. We easily turned it into a Singles’ Day campaign. Create a free account to create yours.
10. Singles’ Day Slot Machine
Do you like Slot machines? We love them! They are excellent at increasing engagement. Use one for your next Singles’ Day Marketing campaign and see your participation rate skyrocket.
This template is elementary to reuse. You simply need to change the background image, text, fonts, and icons in the slot machine. You can also re-design the slot machine if you want to go wild. Check it out!
This experience was created using one of our customizable templates. We easily turned it into a Singles’ Day campaign. Create a free account to create yours.
11. Singles’ Day Tapping Game
If you are looking for something more challenging than lucky cards and slot machines, you might consider this example: A Singles’ Day Tapping game.
With a tapping game, participants need to click on the correct items as fast as possible to earn points. They need to earn enough points in a short period of time to get to the next level. Ultimately, depending on which level they get to, they will be given a discount code. The higher the level they got to, the better the discount code they got.
You can try this exciting Singles’ Day Marketing idea below:
This experience was created using one of our customizable templates. We easily turned it into a Singles’ Day campaign. Create a free account to create yours.
12. Guided Selling experience
Most of the Singles’ Day Marketing examples we showed you before were gamified experiences. However, you can also create a Singles’ Day marketing campaign where you help customers browse through your offers with a Guided Selling experience.
In other words, you will ask customers about what they are looking for, their preferences, and their budget. Depending on their answers, you will show them personalized Singles’ Day offers that you have.
This is an excellent idea as many offers are available on a day like Singles’ Day. Therefore, it is always great to help your customers find the best offers!
This is a readily available template, ready for you to customize and turn into your very own Singles’ Day campaign.
13. Beauty catalog
Beauty is among the top product categories purchased by Singles’ Day shoppers. If you sell beauty products, you can turn your catalog into an interactive one where customers can flip through the pages, click on different items, and even add them directly to their shopping carts.
This is a readily available template, ready for you to customize and turn into your very own Singles’ Day campaign.
14. Gamified product suggester
Suggesting the right products to shoppers always leads to higher sales. Now imagine a gamified experience that is a game and a product-suggesting tool at the same time! This Gamified Product Suggester can be a beautiful and effective addition to your website on Singles’ Day. You can customize the experience to match your special offers and campaign theme.
This is a readily available template, ready for you to customize and turn into your very own Singles’ Day campaign.
15. User-generated contest
This Singles’ Day idea enables your audience to actively participate by submitting their own content, involving them further by allowing them to vote for their favorite entries.
Imagine the buzz as customers share their photos or videos using your campaign-specific hashtag, each vying for the top spot. This method not only amplifies your reach on social media but also deepens customer engagement and loyalty. After gathering entries, simply select the best to feature in the final round and let the community vote to declare the winner on Singles’ Day!
This idea will spread the word about your brand, amplifying brand reach and recognition.
This is a readily available template, ready for you to customize and turn into your very own Singles’ Day campaign.
16. Gift Finder
A significant portion of online shoppers on Singles’ Day will be searching for the best deals on gifts. You can assist them by providing a Gift Finder that guides them toward the perfect gifts based on their criteria, such as category and budget.
Easily create a Singles’ Day-themed Gift Finder to recommend products from your current deals and offers, thereby boosting your online sales.
This is a readily available template, ready for you to customize and turn into your very own Singles’ Day campaign.
Ready to create your own Interactive Singles’ Day Marketing campaigns?
While Singles’ Day marketing isn’t yet a staple in Western countries, being a first mover rather than a latecomer can set you apart. Start planning your Singles’ Day marketing campaign now to be fully prepared for November 11th.
As highlighted in this blog post, all the examples we’ve shared were created using customizable templates from Dot.vu’s marketplace. Selecting and personalizing a template for your Singles’ Day campaign is straightforward and quick.
Interested in seeing how easy and effective our Interactive Content tool can be? Sign up for a free account today, choose a template, and start customizing.
