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Christmas Clicks
Listed under: One Voice
Published: Monday, November 03, 2008
Is your website ready for the festive rush? E-commerce expert Chris Barling explains how retailers can prepare for Christmas shoppers
Is your website ready for the festive rush? E-commerce expert Chris Barling explains how retailers can prepare for Christmas shoppers
An average ecommerce site will see a 30% rise in orders during the Christmas period, although this varies greatly. The key thing is to make sure all parts of the business can cope with the increase.
Plan Ahead
The most important thing of all is the need to plan for success. If there's anything worse than having no orders, it's the frustration of winning business, then running out of stock and having to refund the money. Problems like this produce unhappy customers that won't be coming back.
Deliver the Goods
It may be worth considering a courier for the peak period, or Special Delivery. Giving customers the opportunity to have items sent to their work address can also avoid the risk of missed deliveries. It's a good idea to email customers the tracking details of their goods along with confirmation that the products will be delivered on the next business day.
Market Now
Whatever you are thinking of doing to market your site in the run-up to Christmas, run some small-scale tests as soon as possible and monitor the results. That way you can find out what works best, and refine it to maximise the results. If search engines are important for your traffic, make sure you
put extra effort into your optimisation as early as possible.
Keep it Fresh
In peak periods your stock position can change rapidly and you need to be able to respond immediately. The key thing is to be in complete control. You need to be able to add, modify and delete things from your site immediately at any time of day or night.
Last One Standing
Christmas shoppers fall into two camps: those who buy early and those who generally shop after the 20th of December. Be clear about the last day customers can order for Christmas deliveries and display this at the top and bottom of every web page. Once the deadline has passed, make sure customers know.
Busy Bodies
Most online shoppers are in a hurry, so make sure you have a powerful search capability that can be used to narrow down both categories and price ranges. While search engines may be fine for text-based searching, they can't help customers looking for gifts that fall within a particular price range.
Get Festive
Put up 'decorations' on the website like a Christmas version of your logo and use a holly image as the product divider. Christmas specials can make you seem like you are joining in, and may enable you to start clearing slow moving stock even before Christmas has passed.
Chris Barling is CEO of e-commerce supplier Actinic http://www.actinic.co.uk
An average ecommerce site will see a 30% rise in orders during the Christmas period, although this varies greatly. The key thing is to make sure all parts of the business can cope with the increase.
Plan Ahead
The most important thing of all is the need to plan for success. If there's anything worse than having no orders, it's the frustration of winning business, then running out of stock and having to refund the money. Problems like this produce unhappy customers that won't be coming back.
Deliver the Goods
It may be worth considering a courier for the peak period, or Special Delivery. Giving customers the opportunity to have items sent to their work address can also avoid the risk of missed deliveries. It's a good idea to email customers the tracking details of their goods along with confirmation that the products will be delivered on the next business day.
Market Now
Whatever you are thinking of doing to market your site in the run-up to Christmas, run some small-scale tests as soon as possible and monitor the results. That way you can find out what works best, and refine it to maximise the results. If search engines are important for your traffic, make sure you
put extra effort into your optimisation as early as possible.
Keep it Fresh
In peak periods your stock position can change rapidly and you need to be able to respond immediately. The key thing is to be in complete control. You need to be able to add, modify and delete things from your site immediately at any time of day or night.
Last One Standing
Christmas shoppers fall into two camps: those who buy early and those who generally shop after the 20th of December. Be clear about the last day customers can order for Christmas deliveries and display this at the top and bottom of every web page. Once the deadline has passed, make sure customers know.
Busy Bodies
Most online shoppers are in a hurry, so make sure you have a powerful search capability that can be used to narrow down both categories and price ranges. While search engines may be fine for text-based searching, they can't help customers looking for gifts that fall within a particular price range.
Get Festive
Put up 'decorations' on the website like a Christmas version of your logo and use a holly image as the product divider. Christmas specials can make you seem like you are joining in, and may enable you to start clearing slow moving stock even before Christmas has passed.
Chris Barling is CEO of e-commerce supplier Actinic http://www.actinic.co.uk
