The Christmas holidays are upon us, and it’s becoming more and more obvious by all the decorations in local stores and malls. Christmas trees everywhere, holiday songs, presents, Santas, and, of course, the traditional Christmas discounts have occupied the entire market. But while Christmas cheer is all around us in physical stores, online stores have little to no decorations. 

While this doesn’t seem like a big deal at first glance, in fact, Christmas decoration has a huge impact on customers’ behavior. In other words, these God-awful Mariah Carey songs actually boost profits. Now you might be thinking, why not add these ear tortures to your website as well if it’s so profitable? Well, consider how intrusive they are while you are in a store, and then think of how your audience will react if their speakers suddenly start blasting, “All I want for Christmas is you.” Yes, not the best idea. 

Still, some Christmas decoration on your website is not only recommended, but a must if you want to capture at least part of the massive Christmas spending. So, today, at the start of December, we’ve gathered the best Christmas plugins that will bring holiday cheer to your website and boost your sales and profits as a result. 

How does that work?

The Christmas spirit is not just a myth. Several research studies over the years have proven that people react positively to Christmas decorations, resulting in approximately $1000 on average spending on Christmas shopping alone. About 64.9% of this spending is dedicated to gifts for family, friends, and coworkers. It stands to reason that you will buy Christmas gifts from a decorated place, which gives special attention to the holiday. Not that you are keen on listening to Wham, but rather because your brain follows the path of least resistance. Shopping during the Christmas holidays is stressful, and your brain instinctively pushes you to finish it as fast as you can. So, naturally, you are attracted to the places where it’s most likely to find some Christmas presents.

You might be skeptical of this method, but US holiday sales have grown each year for more than a decade. Moreover, with 96% of Americans buying gifts for their families, this trend is not about to change anytime soon. 

What about online stores?

But why would you care about what offline stores do? You are running an online store. True, but about 63% of Americans purchase their holiday gifts online. So, yeah, you need them. Moreover, there are several other factors that can persuade your audience to spend more than a few dollars on your website. For starters, the Christmas decoration on your website works on two fronts.

On the one hand, it reminds customers that they are in the season of generosity, so buying one more gift or a more expensive item is a sign of benevolence. On the other hand, they feel pressured that Christmas is around the corner, reminding them that everyone is buying gifts, so their child’s new bike may go out of stock at any moment. The famous FOMO (fear of missing out) affects rational thinking and pushes customers to buy. 

The biggest advantage of the Christmas decoration on your online store, however, is the over-stimulation your customers will experience. This results in the so-called ego depletion, which unfortunately doesn’t mean your customers become humbler. This phenomenon actually affects people’s ability to make rational decisions. So, when they see your flashy, new, colorful website look, themed after one of the most beloved holidays out there, your audience’s rational decision-making is hindered, and they are pushed to finish a purchase without feeling buyer’s remorse.

As it seems, having some decoration on your website will definitely benefit you. As a WordPress user, you’re in luck. There are a ton of plugins that will make your website as bright as a Christmas tree. So, let’s have a look at the most useful ones in WordPress’s vast library.

8 WordPress Plugins that will make your website a Christmas fairytale

WordPress, as usual, has hundreds of plugins dedicated to making your website more festive. Many of them work fine. However, only a few can help you achieve the main goal of giving your website a Christmas makeover. We gathered our favorite 8, which are stunning and will help you achieve the already-explained customer response. 

Snow Storm

Let’s start with the basics. If the name is not revealing enough, this plugin will add a romantic snowfall to your website. This way, you can sing to your customers, “Oh, the weather outside is frightful, but our prices are so delightful,” or “Baby, it’s cold outside.” Jokes aside, this small touch will add a nice feeling to your website and make it season-appropriate. 

The plugin itself is highly customizable. You can adjust the color of the snowflakes, how intensive the snowfall is, and the animation interval. You can also enable some additional effects like Melt and Twinkle. Finally, you can even make the snow start gathering at the bottom of the window, which is an excellent touch. 

This is truly an essential plugin, so you can use it on pretty much all sorts of websites, regardless of whether you are monetizing by e-commerce or otherwise. 

Rocket Fireworks

This one is for those focusing on the New Year’s event. For example, if your primary audience is non-Christian, it stands to reason you’d want to showcase the New Year Celebration.  

This relatively lightweight plugin adds a fairly basic but highly effective fireworks animation. As discussed, this will overwhelm the customer’s senses and throw them into ego depletion. The best part of this lightweight plugin is that it’s straightforward to set up, and even if you are new to WordPress, you can add it without any hassle.

Once installed, it will blast multicolor fireworks directly on your website, making it festive and extremely attractive. 

Christmas Greetings

This is perhaps the best plugin to enhance your relationship with your customers. Essentially, this plugin will display greetings and messages to your audience. There are only a few customizations available, but they are quite enough to spread cheer and make your customers feel warm and fuzzy. But what’s a Christmas wish without a Christmas present? That’s why Christmas Greetings allows you to stick promotions to store products or coupons with Woo-commerce. Now that’s a genuine early Christmas gift. Naturally, you can personalize the messages, depending on what data you gather from your customers. 

This plugin is designed for e-commerce users who want to enhance their communication with their customers and offer some promotions with an unmistakable Christmas vibe. 

MMX – Make me Christmas

When it comes to making your website Christmasy, MMX is the full package. It’s an all-in-one Christmas plugin that offers header, body, and footer options. You will be able to cheer your audience with snowmen, snowfall, various types of garlands, Christmas trees, stockings, and presents. There are ten types of Christmas hangings. 

The best part is how easy it is to set up, and it comes with great features. The bad thing is that if you want access to the best, you will have to pay a small amount. Still, it’s not a huge price for spreading some cheer. 

Xmas Lights

This is another low-key Christmas decoration for your website. Essentially, you can add a string of holiday lights to welcome your visitors over the holidays. This neutral celebratory plugin will be effective for business owners with a culturally mixed audience. It does remind you of Christmas, but it doesn’t shove it in your face. 

The plugin is seamless to set up, as all you need to do is install the plugin. There are no additional settings or any other complications. The best part is that these Christmas lights are a great attention grabber without insisting on your attention per se. 

Random Christmas Fact Widget

This is among the more interesting and cultivated holiday plugins. It attracts attention not only with vision but also with exciting content. Essentially, the plugin displays one of 40 random Christmas facts in your sidebar. Each time a user refreshes the website, they will get a new fact. 

When installed, the widget will appear without any CSS formatting so that it can blend perfectly with your website’s style. 

This is an excellent way to grab attention and push your customers to interact with your website. Still, you will have to use a theme with a sidebar to use this plugin. Still, it’s perfect for all sorts of websites, regardless of their functionalities and aims. 

Christmasify

If you want to give your visitors the Christmas market experience, then Christmas is definitely the plugin for you. You can add snow, music, flying Santas, Christmas decorations for your images, and Christmas hangings. You can do this only on your home page or all across your website. The only thing missing will be the sweet aroma of eggnog, but you can always add one as a present in each order. 

The best part is that the plugin is compatible with CSS3 animation, and you can use it through a JavaScript snippet. On top of that, it’s lightweight, easy to use and free. What more can you need? 

Santa Press

Finally, we have what’s, in our opinion, the creme de la creme of Christmas plugins – SantaPress. This plugin offers individual advent calendars on your website. This way, you can give small but meaningful gifts to your customers each day. Naturally, this will stimulate customers to come back every day until Christmas just to get their small presents. In terms of this, it will build brand loyalty, and as usual, the longer someone stays on your website, the higher the chances of them buying something. 

The plugin is masterfully designed and offers eight distinct and stunning layouts. To top it all off, Santa Press also includes various features like Snowfall, WooCommerce integration, hidden mode, external links, and others. If you want to add to the fun, you can even introduce a quiz, which your audience will have to fill out if they’re going to get the price of the day. Santa Press truly gives your website a holiday spirit. 

So, think of 23 small prices that are relevant to your business. They might be small discounts, a special offer, 2 for one coupon, or anything in between. It all depends on your business and what you are ready to give. The rest is up to Santa Press.  

The only downside is that this outstanding plugin is paid, and you will have to prepare around $40 to get it. Still, it’s well worth the price.  

What to avoid

As you can see, you can make your website a genuinely stunning place. Still, there are some things you might want to avoid. For starters, don’t overdo it. Making your website practically a user’s nightmare just because you want to be more flashy, will be counterproductive. So, avoid rapidly flashing lights, as they may cause physical harm to some groups.

Moreover, don’t overuse religious symbols, especially if you are targeting not-so-religious communities. Yes, Christmas is celebrating the birth of our Lord and Savior. Still, it’s also a family holiday, celebrated by people who don’t go to church every Sunday but instead are only brought up in the Christmas traditions. 

Next, be sure to know your audience. For example, if you are advertising to Muslim or Jewish communities, Christian religious symbols won’t do you much good. Instead, opt for celebrating the new year, as this tradition is universal across the entire world (well, maybe not China, which has its own thing going on). 

Finally, don’t destroy your user experience by adding heavy plugins that will compromise your loading speed. After all, nothing is more important than your website’s load time, as a 1-second delay will cost you significantly. 

So, if you want to make your website into a Christmas fairytale, you need a robust, fast, and secure hosting service. 

HostArmada is just that. We offer lightning-fast load speed, robust security, and 99.9% uptime, making your website the best place to shop this Christmas. Check out our plans and give yourself, your website, and your customers the gift you undoubtedly deserve.