To plan campaigns around holidays in other markets, build one shared calendar of the festivals that matter to each audience, confirm each date from a reliable source, and work backwards from the date to set production and approval deadlines. Treat the festival as a moment your customers already care about, not a hook you attach to a sale. Lunar New Year is a useful worked example because its date moves every year.
Step 1: Choose which occasions matter
Not every holiday suits every brand. Start with the markets you actually serve, then ask two questions for each occasion: do your customers behave differently around it (gifting, travel, family meals), and can your product genuinely fit that behaviour? If the honest answer is no, skip it. A relevant presence on three occasions beats a token post on fifteen.
For market adaptation more broadly, see adapting video campaigns for different markets.
Step 2: Confirm dates from a reliable source
Dates for lunisolar festivals change each Gregorian year. Royal Museums Greenwich explains that the Chinese calendar is lunisolar, tracking both the Moon’s phases and Earth’s orbit around the Sun, so Lunar New Year shifts from year to year. For 2027 it falls on Saturday 6 February, the start of the Year of the Goat.
Observance also varies by place. One Australian public holidays site notes that Lunar New Year is not a public holiday in Australia, although it is increasingly observed. That affects trading hours and audience availability differently than in markets where it is a public holiday. Always check the local calendar for each market rather than assuming.
Step 3: Work backwards from the date
A simple lead-time frame for any fixed date:
| Stage | What happens |
|---|---|
| Research and brief | Confirm date, audience behaviour, sensitivities |
| Concept and cultural review | Native-speaker or community review of idea and wording |
| Production | Creative made, subtitled or localised |
| Approvals and scheduling | Legal, brand and platform checks; scheduled posts and ads |
| Live window | The run-up, the day itself and the aftermath |
| Review | What worked, what to change next year |
Set your own durations to match your team. Larger productions, paid media or overseas approvals need more time than a social post. The point is to start from the festival date and count backwards, not from your preferred launch date forwards.
Step 4: Build the calendar itself
One spreadsheet is enough. Useful columns:
- Occasion and market
- Date this year, the source, and the date you checked it
- Whether it is a public holiday there
- Audience behaviour you are responding to
- Campaign idea and owner
- Cultural reviewer and review date
- Lead-time deadlines for each stage
- Notes on colours, symbols, wording or topics to avoid
Review the sheet each quarter, because dates move and your priorities will too.
Step 5: Care and cultural review
Calendars fail when they flatten cultures into one stereotype. A few habits help:
- Use the name your audience uses. A festival may be celebrated by several communities, and City of Melbourne’s guide uses “Lunar New Year” as the general term.
- Have someone from the community review wording, imagery and tone before release.
- Avoid using a festival only for a discount banner. Offer something useful: a gift guide, a booking window, a service that works around the festival.
- Check colours, numbers and symbols for meaning in each market, as covered in localisation vs translation.
Limitations
A calendar prevents missed dates, but it cannot judge taste. Cultural review costs time and sometimes advises against a good idea. That is a better outcome than publishing something that offends the people you wanted to reach. For a full seasonal example, see planning a Lunar New Year campaign, and for the wider picture of reaching overseas audiences see how Australian brands can reach international audiences.
Where Radiance Impact fits
Radiance Impact’s Global division works on localisation and adaptation for overseas audiences, in English and Chinese. To talk through a calendar for your markets, contact the team.
Sources
- Lunar New Year dates, animals and zodiac, Royal Museums Greenwich
- Lunar New Year 2027, Public Holidays Australia
- Melbourne’s best Lunar New Year events, City of Melbourne
