Seasonal campaigns: the Moon Partners view

Seasonal campaigns have always been a challenge of their own for marketing teams: a narrow window of opportunity, fierce competition for the user’s attention, and creatives that go stale within days. It’s a telling example of how fast the rules of the game change, even with a theme that comes back every year.

Moon Partners decided to share what preparing for campaigns like these looks like today from the agency side: where the work starts with clients and teams, which mechanics actually deliver results, where conversion most often gets lost, and what has changed in the approach to creatives over the last few years.

How is your brand preparing for seasonal campaigns today: where does the work start, and what has the biggest influence on the final approach?

Our preparation is mostly media-driven: we create themed content for social media and take part in seasonal collabs. For the clients and teams we work with, we share advice on themed content: what actually lands in the season and which approaches are worth trying. What shapes the final approach most is how early we manage to get in sync with our partners, because the seasonal window is narrow, and the sooner you start preparing content, the more you get to test.

What actually works in seasonal traffic today: which offers, mechanics or creative approaches deliver the best results?

We see this from the agency side, watching what works for our clients and partners across different markets. What performs best are seasonal mechanics built into the product itself rather than just layered on top of a creative, meaning the theme is backed by promotions and gamification, not only by a picture in the ad. The second thing that matters is speed of reaction: the season is short, and the teams that manage to test several approaches in the first few days are the ones who get to scale the best one. We don’t disclose specific figures publicly, but from what we’ve observed, seasonal campaigns deliver noticeably higher engagement than standard ones at a similar acquisition cost.

What mistake in seasonal campaigns most often costs a brand results, even when the creative itself looks strong?

The most common mistake is a creative with nothing behind it. A user sees a bright seasonal ad, clicks through and lands on an ordinary page with no hint of the theme, and that gap between what the creative promises and what comes next kills conversion even with an excellent CTR. The second typical one is being late: teams start preparing the campaign after the season has already kicked off, and spend half the window on approvals instead of tests. The third, which people often forget, is local specifics: a seasonal theme reads differently in different markets, and what works in one market can look out of place in another.

Seasonal campaigns, then vs now: how has your approach to creatives changed over the last few years, what used to work and what works now?

Seasonality used to be enough on its own: a themed picture alone gave a lift, because there wasn’t much of that kind of content and it stood out. Now a user sees dozens of seasonal ads at once, so the theme by itself no longer works, and what wins is whatever looks natural and doesn’t feel like a template. The second shift is the move from one big campaign to a series of short tests: before, teams prepared one approach and launched it, now they try several versions in parallel and quickly reallocate budget. The third, which barely existed before, is consistency between the creative and the product: today a seasonal campaign only works when the theme runs through the user’s entire journey rather than living separately in the ad.