Q4 vs Q1: What To Plan For And What To Accomplish?

Now that we are knee deep in the trenches of Q4 for 2015, what do you remember from the beginning, before the chaos started? Was it the aroma of having everything together and in its right place for the clients, or having loads of time to be able to try those new ideas? For me this Q4 will be my second one, with more clients than last year, but also more knowledge on what to do before the quarter officially started.

To be able to have a not so scary Q4, here are some tips to follow that will ease the crazy holiday season. These are things that helped me be able to have a successful, stress free Q4, (if that’s even possible).

1. PLAN, PLAN, PLAN! This means get started on the outreach as early as you can, perhaps in Q3, when things are not as busy. This applies to affiliates and clients.
2. Budget. Now this could be for paid placements, VIP rates, loyalty campaigns, social campaigns, co-branded landing pages, exclusive offers, specific category offers, and TM+ rights. Start talking with your clients to plan for this as early as possible.
3. Promotional offers. Start talking with your clients about the holiday promos, so that you can be ahead of the game to let the affiliates know and secure placements around those.
4. Check with clients about last ship dates. Then you can accurately inform the affiliates when a customer might not receive a Christmas present in time for December 25^th.

Now Q4 is a stark contrast to Q1! You go from no time to all the time in the world. What do you do with this time, you might ask? Well, again the upcoming 2016 Q1 will be my second one…so I will impart some wisdom on y’all.

For me, Q1 holds the promises of what I want to accomplish through the bright New Year for my clients! I can remember from last year this meant pulling reports, checking affiliates up/down YoY, developing a plan for the New Year, and shooting for the moon with new, colorful ideas for the clients as well as recruiting the heck out of affiliates that never responded or finished their hip new site. So let me say it again – but with bullet points.

• Plan for 2016. This is pulling reports for YoY (year over year) metrics to display the growth and decline of the affiliates in the program. Then developing new ideas for growth of the program, i.e. TM+ bidding, giveaways, reviews, exclusive offers, social campaigns, loyalty campaigns, or having a brainstorming session with the other teams at JEB in order for them to impart wisdom and discuss things you never thought of.
• Recruiting new affiliates. This could be looking on Google with specific key words that match your clients or checking in the network to push offers to matching affiliates.

Now if you didn’t follow my tips for Q4, that is totally okay as we have two months left. You can still implement them now or just write them down and use them next year! But as we are in the last quarter of 2015, you should be thinking about 2016 and what you would like to accomplish for each of your clients. So get on it! Make this Q4 the best one yet for all of your clients. Then be sure the upcoming Q1 is the most productive one yet, with everything you wanted to do but were too afraid to ask, your clients will be ecstatic!