Halloween is a holiday that all age groups enjoy. Kids love to dress up and go trick-or-treating, and adults are just as happy to find a favorite costume, throw parties, and hand out treats to local children. Like we do at Patten Title, real estate businesses like to get in the Halloween spirit with spooky decorations and their own candy.
Now is a great time to market yourself to neighbors and friends so they can get to know you better. Show off your business’ creativity and holiday “spirit” with these 10 ideas to inject fun and make your business more visible at Halloween.
Sponsor a Costume Contest
Everybody loves to get dressed up in funny, heroic, spooky, elegant, or unusual costumes for Halloween. (It’s the best part of the holiday!)
Get creative with a costume contest. You can separate winners by age group, category (best family costume, best superhero, scariest, etc.) or even run the contest for an entire week and hand out prizes each day.
The key is to start promotion as early as possible. If you’re looking for judges, you can pump some energy into your social media channels by having fans “vote” for the best in each category. This will encourage participants to share your page and contest.
Using Canva or other free image-creation software, you build certificates for the winners (and don’t forget to put your logo on the awards). Collaborate with other local businesses for awards (like gift certificates to local restaurants or stores, for instance). Remember, the bigger the prize, the more participants will arrive.
Host a “Haunted” Open House
Are you adventurous? Host an open house on Halloween. Your open house could start before trick-or-treating hours as a way to get the HOA or neighborhood into the spirit. The key is to have some interesting spooky happenings at the house.
-Play scary music
-Dim the lights
-Have some ghosts trolling the hallways
-Give away food and candy, and have an adult costume prize
Pro tip: don’t hide the house too much with darkness and decor. Remember, you still want to show off the awesomeness of the house!
If Halloween night is too hectic, consider hosting the open house the weekend before the holiday. This will get people in the door — and in a holiday mood!
Host a Neighborhood Halloween Party
Another great way to show off a house is to decorate it and host a party (or co-host with neighbors or other friends on the block). Pick a theme (favorite spooky movie or decorate each room or floor with a different candy theme), then pick food and decorations that support that theme.
If you make it a neighborhood party, each house could play a different scary movie. This is a hit if you have multiple homes in the same area on the market.
Prepare a Halloween Photo Booth
Set up a scene outside your business to give kids and families a chance to take a photo worthy of their own social media feeds. Hire a professional photographer — or use your on-staff photographer — to take the pictures and then collect emails to send digital photos to each family.
If you want to set up the photo booth for families to use their cell phones, be sure to have your logo in a location that can’t be easily cropped out. Costumed trick-or-treaters (and parents) will love fun images as part of their memorable evening!
Decorate Your “For-Sale” Signs
Change up your “For Sale” signs for each season. This transformation in signage can be as simple as offering candy in your flyer box or adding a QR code that takes buyers to a fall-themed webpage. You can also “go big” with all-new signs representing the season or a haunted house theme.
Host a Pumpkin Carving Party
Support a local grower and buy several dozen pumpkins before Halloween. Then set up a table with carving tools and invite the neighbors to carve pumpkins. You can turn this into a contest or offer to display the pumpkins at other participating businesses. Families could also take home their creations with a candy treat and donut snacks.
Sponsor a “Best Halloween Yard Decoration” Contest
Encourage every house on the block to get into the Halloween spirit and make decorating the yard part of a holiday competition. This is a great way to encourage drive-by traffic, and you can offer big or small prizes for the best house in the neighborhood (or just bragging rights!). Find neutral judges or encourage judging through social media. You can set up a QR code at a house you have on the market that takes users to a registered site to judge their favorite decorations.
Dress Up Your Social Media
For a simple fix that can incorporate a spooky theme with your branding, add Halloween tricks and treats to your social media channels. This tactic could include highlighting homes that have “spooky” addresses (like Mockingbird Lane, Elm Street, or Privet Drive) or adding a fall theme to your online presence.
Include fall foliage to update curb appeal in the images of homes. Also, consider creating coupons that your followers can turn in for branded goodies or a discount on a service.
Create Branded Trick-or-Treat Bags
Hand out trick-or-treat bags with your company logo and your contact information during October. Incorporate non-candy food into each bag, like branded sticky hands or popping fidget toys.
These giveaways will keep you top of mind while maintaining the holiday spirit. If you are sponsoring a haunted house on the night of Halloween, drop the goody bags off in neighborhood mailboxes the weekend before the holiday to build interest.
Host a Pet Costume Night
Families with pets love to add their fur babies to the Halloween fun. Whether you bring the pets together for a neighborhood picture or invite everyone in the HOA to send in photos of their pets in their best costumes, you can create a pet costume contest.
If you hold an in-person party outdoors, serve hot cocoa and punch — and, of course, include tricks and treats for the pets. If you host a social media contest, be sure to incorporate a prize for the winner (such as a photo session with a local pet photographer).
Above All Else…Be SAFE!
Trick-or-treaters always think that fun and candy are their No. 1 priorities on Halloween. Adults know that safety is their top concern. At Patten Title, we understand that both sides are right, so we’re reminding you of the top safety tips to follow for both the Halloween crowd and homeowners providing the treats.
