Tip #65: Have Fun with April Fool’s Day

Next Monday April 1 is April Fool’s Day. That means you have six more days to plan a creative way to celebrate this fun holiday in your store and create a marketing buzz at the same time.  Why not play a few April Fool’s Day jokes on your customers, or help them play one on their friends and family. One of many ideas may be to create a “zero calorie chocolate box” promotion that will just be available on April Fool’s Day. Then, the box could be empty (zero calories, of course!) but contain a coupon for your store along with information about the health benefits of chocolate. You could promote via social media leading up the day that you’re going to have a big product reveal.

Get inspired by reading what some large companies such as Google and Burger King have done over the years to create a buzz around April Fool’s Day:

• From Google Voice for Pets (record audio directly from your dog or cat’s vocal cords) to the Jargon-Bot for Google Apps (translates business jargon into coherent English), Google has had lots of fun with this day.
• Among this list of business pranks, Burger King made left-handed Whoppers while YouTube turned its videos upside down.
• In 2011, the Chick-Fil-A cows quit and migrated to the beach while Richard Branson bought Pluto and made it a planet again.
• This roundup of the best pranks of 2012 includes a mood color-changing car, Kodak kitten printer and Skype for String.

As you plan your fun prank, be careful not to confuse or frustrate your customers but to make it enjoyable for everyone involved and something they’d want to share with others (which spreads the word about your store). Be sure to leave us a comment below to share your fun ideas and let us know how they work out!

April Fool’s Day is one of many fun holidays noted on the annual RCI wall calendar provided to our members. If you’re not an RCI member, learn more about the many benefits of joining today.