Holidays are just around the corner! They are not only the most profitable season in the year (for most businesses), but also the busiest. e-Merchants, in particular, should be ready preparing special discounts, rebates, deals and other incentives to take full advantage of this season. Holidays officially start on black Friday and Cyber Monday, so, how should you prepare your business? – Here are a few tips:
- Make sure that your website is prepared for the increase on traffic: Poor performance on your website can result in customer dissatisfaction, and missed sales. It’s recommended analyzing last year’s traffic patterns to have an idea of peak times and dates in advance. In case you didn’t track this information last year, a little benchmarking goes a long way!
- Keep inventory updated: Since most of online shoppers buy gifts for their relatives and friends, the last thing they want to see is that the item they are trying to buy is on backorder. Identify the most popular item in your online store, and make sure you have enough available.
- Make your customer’s purchase experience easier: Most of online shoppers are looking to buy gifts on holiday season. Maker their shopping experience easier and create categories based on price, reviews or type of gift (i.e. ”for her”, “for him”). Always show the delivery dates for the products, and the different shipping options that they have.
- Functionality: Make sure that your buyers are able to check the status of their order, that they can easily find specials and promotions. Identify if there are places where the users are abandoning the website because they get stuck or any other reason.
- Create an attractive design: Include some holiday flair to your website, to make people feel the spirit of holidays. Besides it will make your website look fresh, and you´ll making holiday shopping a fun experience for your buyers.
- Make your buyers feel secure: Demonstrate that your website is encrypted and secure. Display that you have a SSL certificate. This will make your buyer feel comfortable buying from you.
- Make the paying process faster: Traffic in your website will increase on holidays, so it´s important to reduce that traffic in order to avoid poor website performance. One thing you could do is include a feature that makes faster the paying process, create something that doesn´t require to create an account first.
Happy holiday season!
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