According to Emarketer, holiday retail ecommerce sales will grow 17% this year. This represents a huge opportunity to improve your ecommerce marketing strategy to achieve the highest conversion rate in your online store.
Holiday season starts on Thanksgiving Day and ends on New Year. During this period, you should consider these 5 important dates for your ecommerce sales:
- Thanksgiving Day: November 24, 2016
- Black Friday: November 25, 2016
- Cyber Monday: November 28, 2016
- Green Monday: December 12, 2016
- Free Shipping Day: December 16, 2016
Even if holidays are just around the corner and if you just got your development team to get your online store ready for this season, here are 7 last-minute tips that will surely boost your ecommerce holiday sales this 2016.
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Digital Advertising
Investing in online ads is a must for this season. You should focus on spreading the word about your attractive sales promotions and products through social media campaigns, display/rich media banners, and AdWords. Let people know that you have a better offer than your competitors.
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Content Marketing
If you create useful content for your holiday shoppers in your ecommerce blog and social media channels, they will appreciate it. During holidays, people might get overwhelmed so it’s really helpful to give them shopping guides, gift recommendations, and other tips to help them with their purchasing lists.
Remember to keep the content visual and concise. You can use product videos, infographics, GIFs and pictures to share the information with subscribers and followers.
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Go Mobile
Last year’s holiday season, mobile devices generated 52.33% of the online shopping traffic. Also according to IBM, 60% of online shoppers leave a mobile site if it offers a poor mobile shopping experience. This is why you should build a responsive site/mobile app with the best UX/UI Design to increase your conversion rate.
Check if your ecommerce site is mobile friendly with Google’s tool and if not, contact us to help you right away!
Ensure to have special discounts and promotions to attract potential shoppers. Daily flash deals with urging messages can be effective to grab ecommerce visitors’ attention.
Don’t forget to highlight your holidays hot deals and promotions in your ecommerce site in popups, headers and sidebars without being too distractive.
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Upselling
If you want to make a more profitable sale, you can convince targeted buyers to buy an upgrade version of the product they choose. On the other side, you can also recommend complementary products or offer them in a package with a discount on total.
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Shipping and returns
44% of the shopping cart abandonment happens because of high rates or limited options for shipping. It’s important to low your shipping costs during this season or offer it for free to stay competitive.
Returns are an important thing to consider during holidays. When people buy gifts they are mainly concerned about their return policy. Make sure it’s clear and easy to locate on your ecommerce site. And if you don’t want to deal with this issue, we recommend using an app that can handle all your product returns and refunds.
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Remarketing
When customers don’t make it to the payment step, reach them by email with personalized messages to persuade them to finish the shopping process on your site. First try using a friendly reminder, then create a sense of urgency and at last offer them an incentive to complete their purchase.
Now that you got our tips to boost your ecommerce holiday sales, it’s time to include them in your holiday marketing strategy to get the most purchases this season. Remember to monitor your efforts and keep the track of your campaigns to make the necessary adjustments to improve your results. If you surpass your 2016 ecommerce goals with holiday sales, you will definitely be prepared to start next year on the right foot.
