As end-of-year sales begin earlier than ever before, it’s safe to say the holiday spirit is just around the corner!
End-of-year sales begin earlier each year—Black Friday has traditionally been when many people look for holiday gifts in November, but holiday spending is happening even sooner. In 2022, nearly 30% of consumers started holiday shopping as early as September, and 70% of consumers planned to start before Thanksgiving.
If you haven’t heard already, the Big 3– meaning Amazon, Walmart and Target, are beginning their holiday sales in early October. While we hope you’ve already begun your holiday sale preparation, we’re here to help if you haven’t already. The following tips will help you maximize your online shop’s potential this holiday season, whether you’re just starting or already have an established store.
1. Update your product photos and videos
Many brick-and-mortar establishments decorate with festive window displays during the holiday shopping season. Similar to how you would decorate a physical storefront, you should also give your website the same level of care and attention.
The baseline of all ecommerce product photography begins with product on white i.e. getting clear, high-quality photos of your products on a white background. At soona, we consider that to be step one. From there, it’s time to explore. With significant shopping events such as Black Friday and Cyber Monday, you can incorporate festive photography with colorful backdrops– whether they are brand colors or seasonal.
Add some holiday cheer to your product photography as part of your site’s seasonal celebrations. If you want to get more people interested in your product images, try setting them against a festive backdrop or a holiday lifestyle scene. You want your product photos and videos to be so good, people can’t help but share them on platforms like Instagram and Pinterest.
2. Prepare your website for online visitors
Start by making sure people can easily shop at your online store. A customer's first impression of your online store can significantly impact whether or not they purchase from you.
With the help of simple website templates, you can make a design that’s consistent with your brand and includes some seasonal touches. To direct shoppers through your product offers and attract their attention, add a holiday-themed layout, highlight holiday products, and provide holiday-specific content.
It would be disastrous if your website went down at the busiest time of the year. Your store can crash when too many users access the site at once, which often occurs on Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Check with your web host directly to ensure your site can handle increased traffic if you haven’t seen surges in visitors before.
You should also prepare for the higher-than-usual volume of shoppers by developing a strategic workforce plan to manage employees and customer care agents before the holiday season begins.
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3. Highlight your uniqueness
During the holiday season when many businesses offer discounts to attract customers, it can be challenging for small business owners to compete on price against their larger competitors. This holiday season, your small business’s sales and marketing efforts should highlight your company’s distinctive qualities to convince consumers to shop with you rather than your competitors.
Whatever sets you apart from the competition is what makes you special! Now’s the time to find out what makes you unique, so you can tailor your messaging and content around that knowledge.
4. Plan your inventory early
Check with your suppliers now to make sure you’re adequately stocked to handle the spike in sales. That’ll help you avoid long wait times and dissatisfied consumers who find out their must-have gift is out of stock or on backorder.
While it’s completely necessary to stock your shop with lots of holiday items, it's also wise to stock items customers can use year-round. From working with over 17,000 brands, we know that stocking your best-sellers, and placing them first, can help convert customers!
5. Highlight your special offers and discounts
Customers won’t be as enthusiastic or willing to spend at your store during the holidays if they don’t see prominent signs advertising sales and other incentives to do so. Make sure holiday deals are prominently displayed so buyers can take advantage of them without any additional effort on their side.
Interactive banner ads that scroll across the top of a website are a great way to bring attention to discounts and deals. You can also generate traffic by posting frequent promotions on your social media sites such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and even the latest ecommerce product, TikTok Shop. Customers can locate you quickly and understand why your business is the best option for them throughout the holiday shopping season.
6. Sell your products on social channels
Your sales plan is incomplete without social selling. Nearly 20% of consumers were inspired by social media for holiday gift ideas during the 2022 season.
During busy shopping seasons, integrating your online store with social media can help as many people see your products as possible. Adding product links to your Instagram posts and TikTok videos can increase sales, allowing users to quickly go from your feed or videos to your online store.
7. Cue up some marketing emails
Now’s the time to step up your email communication with customers. Marketing emails are a fantastic strategy for keeping your brand in clients’ minds during the holiday season and beyond.
Get in touch with your email list including past customers and potential leads as soon as possible. Encourage them to go ahead and do all their holiday shopping now to avoid the hassle of last-minute shopping and shipping delays. Adding time limits and a sense of urgency to your promotional emails is a sure technique to get people to act fast.
Besides a well-thought-out email strategy, sending emails to consumers who abandon their carts without completing a transaction can be an effective way to re-engage them and convince them to complete the purchase.
8. Create easy gifting options
One way to help your customers save time during the holiday shopping season is to offer obvious gifting options available in your online store. If you want to make it even easier for customers to shop for and buy holiday gifts from your online store, consider establishing a gifts product category. We also love a good gift guide targeted for all your loved ones. In addition, you can provide gifting add-ons at checkout like gift wrapping and personalized gift notes.
9. Launch a new product or run a special promotion
If your online store needs an extra marketing push for the holidays, launch a flash sale or product drop to generate brand awareness and enthusiasm. Temporarily reducing prices or introducing a new product can spark shopper interest in your products and help you sell specific inventory.
Marketing promotions and time-sensitive events with digital coupons and personalized codes customers can redeem at your online store can effectively boost brand recognition on social media, gather new leads, and reward your most loyal customers.
10. Ramp up your customer support
During the holiday season, customers still expect a positive shopping experience. Your customers will be grateful if they can easily find your contact information should they have any questions about their orders. If you expect a large number of calls, you may need to hire extra temporary help to handle them.
The following are more suggestions for increasing your customer support efforts:
- You can guarantee round-the-clock service for your customers by implementing instant messaging features such as live chat or chat bots on your website.
- Create a page dedicated solely to commonly asked questions and answer them in detail to reduce the need for extra customer support.
- Check out several ticket-tracking and customer-feedback-monitoring programs to better manage your inflow of inquiries and responses to them.
Exemplary customer service is crucial to the success of any online store. Make sure your customers know what to anticipate from by communicating clearly on matters such as holiday shipment schedules and any applicable discounts or special offers.
11. Optimize your checkout process
You’ve launched your holiday advertising efforts, stocked your online shelves, and customers are visiting your store. But will the customers be able to make purchases without any issues? Research shows that 28% of online shoppers abandon their carts due to complex checkout processes.
Your store’s checkout process should be simple and easy to understand. Ensure the checkout page is easy to navigate and all required fields are clearly labeled. Keep an eye out for anything that might slow down your customer or make them abandon their cart.
Once optimized, test it out. Going through the checkout process yourself is the best way to make sure it’s seamless.
Get the best holiday product photography from soona
Including high-quality images and videos of your products is crucial when it comes to getting your online shop ready for the holiday season.
soona offers access to a digital platform where you can develop and share your own content. Our holiday trend sets and Santa hands pack are the best bet for your holiday season product photography. Book a shoot with us today, and we’ll help you replace your outdated product videos and images with high-quality content you and your customers will love.
As end-of-year sales begin earlier than ever before, it’s safe to say the holiday spirit is just around the corner!
End-of-year sales begin earlier each year—Black Friday has traditionally been when many people look for holiday gifts in November, but holiday spending is happening even sooner. In 2022, nearly 30% of consumers started holiday shopping as early as September, and 70% of consumers planned to start before Thanksgiving.
If you haven’t heard already, the Big 3– meaning Amazon, Walmart and Target, are beginning their holiday sales in early October. While we hope you’ve already begun your holiday sale preparation, we’re here to help if you haven’t already. The following tips will help you maximize your online shop’s potential this holiday season, whether you’re just starting or already have an established store.
1. Update your product photos and videos
Many brick-and-mortar establishments decorate with festive window displays during the holiday shopping season. Similar to how you would decorate a physical storefront, you should also give your website the same level of care and attention.
The baseline of all ecommerce product photography begins with product on white i.e. getting clear, high-quality photos of your products on a white background. At soona, we consider that to be step one. From there, it’s time to explore. With significant shopping events such as Black Friday and Cyber Monday, you can incorporate festive photography with colorful backdrops– whether they are brand colors or seasonal.
Add some holiday cheer to your product photography as part of your site’s seasonal celebrations. If you want to get more people interested in your product images, try setting them against a festive backdrop or a holiday lifestyle scene. You want your product photos and videos to be so good, people can’t help but share them on platforms like Instagram and Pinterest.
2. Prepare your website for online visitors
Start by making sure people can easily shop at your online store. A customer's first impression of your online store can significantly impact whether or not they purchase from you.
With the help of simple website templates, you can make a design that’s consistent with your brand and includes some seasonal touches. To direct shoppers through your product offers and attract their attention, add a holiday-themed layout, highlight holiday products, and provide holiday-specific content.
It would be disastrous if your website went down at the busiest time of the year. Your store can crash when too many users access the site at once, which often occurs on Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Check with your web host directly to ensure your site can handle increased traffic if you haven’t seen surges in visitors before.
You should also prepare for the higher-than-usual volume of shoppers by developing a strategic workforce plan to manage employees and customer care agents before the holiday season begins.
{{studio-ad="/external-components"}}
3. Highlight your uniqueness
During the holiday season when many businesses offer discounts to attract customers, it can be challenging for small business owners to compete on price against their larger competitors. This holiday season, your small business’s sales and marketing efforts should highlight your company’s distinctive qualities to convince consumers to shop with you rather than your competitors.
Whatever sets you apart from the competition is what makes you special! Now’s the time to find out what makes you unique, so you can tailor your messaging and content around that knowledge.
4. Plan your inventory early
Check with your suppliers now to make sure you’re adequately stocked to handle the spike in sales. That’ll help you avoid long wait times and dissatisfied consumers who find out their must-have gift is out of stock or on backorder.
While it’s completely necessary to stock your shop with lots of holiday items, it's also wise to stock items customers can use year-round. From working with over 17,000 brands, we know that stocking your best-sellers, and placing them first, can help convert customers!
5. Highlight your special offers and discounts
Customers won’t be as enthusiastic or willing to spend at your store during the holidays if they don’t see prominent signs advertising sales and other incentives to do so. Make sure holiday deals are prominently displayed so buyers can take advantage of them without any additional effort on their side.
Interactive banner ads that scroll across the top of a website are a great way to bring attention to discounts and deals. You can also generate traffic by posting frequent promotions on your social media sites such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and even the latest ecommerce product, TikTok Shop. Customers can locate you quickly and understand why your business is the best option for them throughout the holiday shopping season.
6. Sell your products on social channels
Your sales plan is incomplete without social selling. Nearly 20% of consumers were inspired by social media for holiday gift ideas during the 2022 season.
During busy shopping seasons, integrating your online store with social media can help as many people see your products as possible. Adding product links to your Instagram posts and TikTok videos can increase sales, allowing users to quickly go from your feed or videos to your online store.
7. Cue up some marketing emails
Now’s the time to step up your email communication with customers. Marketing emails are a fantastic strategy for keeping your brand in clients’ minds during the holiday season and beyond.
Get in touch with your email list including past customers and potential leads as soon as possible. Encourage them to go ahead and do all their holiday shopping now to avoid the hassle of last-minute shopping and shipping delays. Adding time limits and a sense of urgency to your promotional emails is a sure technique to get people to act fast.
Besides a well-thought-out email strategy, sending emails to consumers who abandon their carts without completing a transaction can be an effective way to re-engage them and convince them to complete the purchase.
8. Create easy gifting options
One way to help your customers save time during the holiday shopping season is to offer obvious gifting options available in your online store. If you want to make it even easier for customers to shop for and buy holiday gifts from your online store, consider establishing a gifts product category. We also love a good gift guide targeted for all your loved ones. In addition, you can provide gifting add-ons at checkout like gift wrapping and personalized gift notes.
9. Launch a new product or run a special promotion
If your online store needs an extra marketing push for the holidays, launch a flash sale or product drop to generate brand awareness and enthusiasm. Temporarily reducing prices or introducing a new product can spark shopper interest in your products and help you sell specific inventory.
Marketing promotions and time-sensitive events with digital coupons and personalized codes customers can redeem at your online store can effectively boost brand recognition on social media, gather new leads, and reward your most loyal customers.
10. Ramp up your customer support
During the holiday season, customers still expect a positive shopping experience. Your customers will be grateful if they can easily find your contact information should they have any questions about their orders. If you expect a large number of calls, you may need to hire extra temporary help to handle them.
The following are more suggestions for increasing your customer support efforts:
- You can guarantee round-the-clock service for your customers by implementing instant messaging features such as live chat or chat bots on your website.
- Create a page dedicated solely to commonly asked questions and answer them in detail to reduce the need for extra customer support.
- Check out several ticket-tracking and customer-feedback-monitoring programs to better manage your inflow of inquiries and responses to them.
Exemplary customer service is crucial to the success of any online store. Make sure your customers know what to anticipate from by communicating clearly on matters such as holiday shipment schedules and any applicable discounts or special offers.
11. Optimize your checkout process
You’ve launched your holiday advertising efforts, stocked your online shelves, and customers are visiting your store. But will the customers be able to make purchases without any issues? Research shows that 28% of online shoppers abandon their carts due to complex checkout processes.
Your store’s checkout process should be simple and easy to understand. Ensure the checkout page is easy to navigate and all required fields are clearly labeled. Keep an eye out for anything that might slow down your customer or make them abandon their cart.
Once optimized, test it out. Going through the checkout process yourself is the best way to make sure it’s seamless.
Get the best holiday product photography from soona
Including high-quality images and videos of your products is crucial when it comes to getting your online shop ready for the holiday season.
soona offers access to a digital platform where you can develop and share your own content. Our holiday trend sets and Santa hands pack are the best bet for your holiday season product photography. Book a shoot with us today, and we’ll help you replace your outdated product videos and images with high-quality content you and your customers will love.
