It’s Summer, But Is Your Business Prepared For the Holidays?

We’re in the heart of summer, with record temperatures appearing around the world. Even so, it’s about time for your marketing team to start thinking about the coming holiday season.

Whether you’re repping Kwanzaa, Hanukkah, or regular old Black Friday, you need to take concentrated steps to prep your content and platform for a surge of shoppers.

Why shift your focus so early?

According to Facebook’s holiday survey, 20 percent of holiday shoppers in the United States start making holiday purchases in October or the months preceding it. (Even if it is a holiday stereotype, not everyone procrastinates!)

If you want to take advantage of consumer interest in the holidays, then you need to be prepared for the ambitions of these advanced shoppers. It might be summer now, but it’s time to get ready for the end-of-year rush.

Look Back to Move Forward

As you’re getting ready for the holidays, you’ll want to look back at last year’s analytics. If you run a successful marketing campaign or deal during the last holiday rush, it’s worthwhile to reuse some of the elements that performed well.

Look at your old analytics and see if you can’t answer some of the following questions:

• What did last year’s sales look like, and how much inventory will you need to meet those requirements again?
• How many orders should you anticipate?
• How many people should you have at the ready?
• Do you need to hire seasonal staff?
• How quickly can you ship and deliver your products?
• Did you have to troubleshoot any issues last year?
• How can you work ahead to prevent any delays in shipping or development?

Make the Holidays Mobile

The aforementioned Facebook survey also made it clear that e-commerce businesses are going to have to go mobile this holiday season. Why? Because, as of 2018, nearly 50 percent of U.S. consumers shopped for holiday gifts on their phones. In 2014, that number was only 30 percent.

It’s clear that consumer reliance upon mobile is on the rise. So, as the holidays approach, why not test your platform for its mobile compatibility? Make sure that the following elements register on phones as well as they do on the desktop to ensure the best user experience:

• Page loading speed
• Pop-up to content ratio
• Cart accessibility

Start Generating Leads

It’s already time to start reaching out to consumers through your newsletter and social media accounts. If you start cultivating interest via specials or deals, you’ll be able to draw in more conversions come holiday season.

How can you entice those leads?

• Holiday discounts: Stores looking to capitalize on Black Friday or Cyber Monday deals, for example, need to put out discounts, or else they’ll get lost in the consumer wave.
• Holiday bundles: Xbox, for example, sells its games alongside its consoles to great success.
• Free shipping: Make it easy for your consumer to deliver gifts to far-away friends and family.
• Gift wrapping: You can include a wrapping fee so that the products you’re shipping across the country meet consumers’ holiday standards.

Don’t let the summer heat slow your marketing roll. The holidays are coming, and your business needs to be prepared to take them on.

Conclusion

Is your company in need of help? MV3 Marketing Agency has numerous Marketing experts ready to assist you. Contact MV3 Marketing to jump-start your business.

Image attribution: Prostock-studio – stock.adobe.com