10 Best Examples of Christmas Marketing Campaigns for 2025

Christmas is finally here, the most wonderful time of the year! With Halloween behind us, it feels like every day brings us closer to the season of joy. This is the perfect time for brand owners and businesses to start planning their special Christmas marketing campaigns, as it’s the most important time of the year for making a big impact.

Planning Christmas campaigns is always considered a huge and challenging step for both small and big brands and businesses, as it directly impacts the increase in brand visibility. Therefore, inspiration from the best Christmas marketing campaigns can be very helpful. But what are the best Christmas marketing ideas? And how can you take inspiration without copying their concepts?

In this article, we will walk you through the best Christmas marketing campaigns from major brands that went viral and set the standard for the best Christmas campaign ideas.

So let’s get started before wishing you a holly jolly Christmas!

As you may know, running your own campaign can be expensive, especially if you are a startup brand. That’s why you’ll need the influencer community to help run your campaign. Before talking about the best Christmas marketing campaigns, we would like to introduce you to an influencer marketing platform.

The Best Influencer Marketing Platform for Christmas Campaigns: Ainfluencer

Allow us to introduce Ainfluencer, the top influencer marketing platform that’s completely free. If you’re a Shopify user, you’re in luck! Ainfluencer connects Shopify merchants with over 1 million active influencers and creators on Instagram and TikTok.

With Ainfluencer, you can easily create content and get your product or service seen on popular social media platforms like YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and Snapchat. Our smart AI tool finds you the best influencers for your brand, so you can directly work out deals with them. Plus, your payments are safe with our secure Escrow system and resolution center.

By joining Ainfluencre, you can:

• Create unlimited campaigns for free.
• Connect with as many influencers as you need without any cost.
• Receive unlimited proposals at no charge.
• Finalize deals without extra fees.
• Create and publish unlimited content for free.

For our non-English speaking friends, no worries; Ainfluencer is available in 6 languages. Use the marketplace in any of these languages and translate content with just one click. So join Ainfluencre, the best influencer marketing platform before you miss this great opportunity.

10 Most Inspiring Christmas Marketing Campaigns

For hundreds of years, Christmas has remained everyone’s favorite time of the year. Even when you look at the history of influencer marketing, one thing stands out: using Christmas advertising campaigns to reach a more targeted audience.

1. Starbucks Red Cup Day

Did you know Starbucks didn’t just get famous for its coffee but also for its brilliant marketing ideas? One of their clever strategies was intentionally misspelling customers’ names on coffee cups. This fun idea got people sharing their hilarious name mistakes on social media, creating viral buzz and making Starbucks even more popular!

Every year, Starbucks comes up with creative ideas for its Christmas marketing campaigns. One of their most loved traditions is starting the holiday season with their iconic holiday-themed red cups. This fun tradition started back in 1997 and has been spreading joy and excitement ever since!

Every Christmas, customers can’t wait to see Starbucks’ new festive cup designs, filled with holiday spirit for everyone to enjoy. Influencers and digital creators use the special designs for posting and taking pictures, which is another clever marketing strategy for Starbucks.

2. McDonald’s: Inner Child

Since McDonald’s collaboration with Travis Scott on an influencer marketing campaign in September 2020, people have been excited to see what their Christmas campaign would be like. In December, McDonald’s delivered a heartwarming commercial that showed how a simple McDonald’s burger can bring joy to someone’s day.

The campaign featured a touching ad about a single mother trying to reconnect with her teenage son, who happens to be very introverted and constantly compares his current mood to his inner child. The child becomes happy after going to the McDonald’s shop and getting a burger.

The ad quickly gained over millions of YouTube views and went viral on social media, boosted by the #ReindeerReady campaign. McDonald’s used the emotional story in the ad to promote its Christmas menu, which helped them get more attention and positive reactions from people.

3. Coca Cola Truck Tour

Have you heard about Coca-Cola’s iconic red Christmas truck? The company came up with a brilliant Christmas promotion idea, bringing the magic of Santa’s spirit to customers with their huge festive trucks.

Coca-Cola’s Christmas Truck Tour invites everyone to enjoy the holiday spirit with sparkling lights, music, games, and chances to win Coca-Cola prizes. Guests can grab seasonal treats, take selfies with the famous red truck, and light the whole town up with their cheerful noises.

4. IKEA’s Christmas campaign: “Hej Hej Hej”

Do you know what they say about shopping and how it’s never too late to purchase something, especially if it’s for Christmas? Everyone will feel cheerful when it comes to shopping at IKEA, even little dogs like dachshunds.

IKEA released a commercial video for Christmas featuring a sad little dachshund staring out the window, upset and whining. When his owner comes back home with a bright yellow couch from IKEA, the dog’s mood instantly changes. He happily settles onto the couch, watching another dog outside, feeling loved and cozy. It looks like even dogs are happy with every purchase!

5. Frito Lay: Share More Joy

Who says Santa always wants cookies? Frito-Lay Canada, is shaking up holiday traditions with a playful twist on the classic cookies-for-Santa idea.

In this Christmas marketing campaign, Santa visits a house filled with cookies, following the Canadian tradition of leaving sweets for him. However, this time, Santa craves something salty instead of cookies, so he grabs a bag of Frito-Lay chips. The goal of this Christmas campaign is to connect with Canadians who prefer salty snacks during the holidays. The campaign was filled with fun letters in big Canadian newspapers like The Globe and Mail, Toronto Star, Vancouver Sun, and Montreal Gazette. 

6. LEGO: Build a Playful Holiday

Presents are the best part of Christmas, even for adults, but for kids, the excitement is on a whole different level. What if in the holiday season, we all feel the joy and excitement of being a kid again?

In 2022, LEGO launched its biggest holiday Christmas marketing campaign across TV, digital platforms, and stores in 35 markets. The campaign, featuring Katy Perry, focused on children sharing what the holidays mean to them. LEGO wanted to encourage people of all ages to have fun and enjoy the joy of being a kid during the holiday season.

To support their Christmas campaign idea, LEGO posted holiday content on social media. This included #LEGOtakeover (where kids took over LEGO’s Instagram), new gift collections, fan-made LEGO creations, and videos with Katy Perry. LEGO’s website also had a Holiday Gifts page with gift ideas, special deals, DIY projects, and photos shared by customers. 

7. Macy’s: Give Love. Give Style.

If you’re looking for great Christmas marketing ideas, Macy’s is a must-see. They launched a Christmas marketing campaign featuring their Macy’s Gift Finder to help people find the perfect presents for everyone on their list.

Macy’s has one of the most helpful gift finders on their website, where customers can search for gifts based on gender, age, category, budget, and more.

To make holiday shopping easier, Macy’s provides a variety of services, including daily live streams with style and beauty tips, free personal stylist assistance, and extended store hours. They also offer a mobile app for seamless shopping, exclusive deals and rewards, and convenient options like buy-online-pick-up-in-store or same-day delivery.

Macy’s also offers in-store Santa visits, and for kids who can’t attend in person, there’s a fij , n experience called Macy’s Santaland at Home.

8. Mark & Spencer: Thismas Not Thatmas

Let’s talk about the Mark & Spencer Christmas marketing campaign, featuring one of the most iconic celebrities from the Ted Lasso series, Hannah Waddingham.

Who says you have to follow traditions during the Christmas season? While everyone thinks it’s a must, that’s not actually the case. 

Marks & Spencer’s 2023 Christmas campaign, “Thismas Not Thatmas,” encourages breaking away from Christmas conventions and doing what you love. The ad mixes relatability, celebrity endorsements, and a fresh, non-traditional approach, showing marketers that holiday campaigns don’t always need sentimental clichés.

9. John Lewis: Monty the Penguin 

John Lewis’ ads are always a big deal when it’s Christmas season. Their Christmas advertising campaigns are known for their heartwarming stories and lovable characters. Monty the Penguin became a huge success, boosting sales, earning millions, and going viral on X (formerly Twitter). Fans adored Monty so much that his toys sold out quickly, and the ad’s song even reached number three on iTunes.

The John Lewis Monty the Penguin Christmas ad from 2014 is a sweet story about friendship and the joy of giving. It shows a boy named Sam and his penguin friend, Monty, who wishes for a partner. On Christmas morning, Sam makes Monty’s dream come true by surprising him with another penguin, Mabel.

The ad beautifully captures the magic of Christmas and the happiness of giving people the Christmas they wish for, making it truly memorable.

10. Google Assistant: Home Alone

The last Christmas marketing campaign we are about to discuss is from Google. Google launched an assistant program ad in 2018 featuring the Home Alone star Kevin McCallister, played by Macaulay Culkin.

Google’s Home Alone Again campaign blends nostalgia with modern tech. The ad humorously showed Google Assistant helping Kevin with tasks like ordering aftershave, talking to the delivery man and fending off burglars. It became 2018’s most-viewed holiday ad, with millions of views and strong social media appearance.

Conclusion

We’ve shared some of the best and most memorable Christmas ads from big brands like Starbucks and Coca-Cola. Some of these ads might not be as fancy as you’d expect, but they show that even a simple quiet marketing campaign with one main character can have a long lasting impact. Get inspired by these campaigns and create your own Christmas marketing campaign.

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