by Lisa Suttora on December 2, 2011
With record Black Friday online sales ($816 Million) and the online biggest shopping day of the year Cyber Monday ($125 Billion in sales) behind us, you might think the best of the holiday selling season is behind us…
But nothing could be further from the truth!
There are still three solid weeks in this holiday prime time season, and there’s still plenty of time to stoke the fires of your online sales!
In fact there are FOUR big “Online Holiday Paydays” in December!
Don’t think that these Holiday Paydays are simply random dates picked by some Madison Avenue marketing execs.
These online paydays reflect historical consumer buying patterns and should be ignored!
In fact, Forrester Research recently reported that online shoppers continue to increase their use of the web for holiday shopping on these key dates.
So when are these Online Holiday Paydays? Take a look…
Now that you know what dates to drive to, let’s talk about what to do to capitalize on these dates. …Because buyers will be shopping… you want them to shop with you!
Readying Your Store to Cash In on the Top 4 December Online Holiday Paydays
Product Marketing & Visibility. If I could have have one wish for every independent online merchant this holiday season, it would be the gift of product marketing and visibility during the holidays. Nothing is more important than getting out there and promoting your store.
Even just the slightest bit of marketing can make a huge difference the number of targeted buyers who visit and shop at your store.
You don’t have to break the bank or spend hours a day marketing either!
These five, easy, low-cost ways to market your holiday can bring in big results:
- Emailing your customer list to let them know about up coming promotions
- Using Twitter & Facebook to offer exclusive coupon codes and social media only deals
- Including a coupon for a special discount in every package you sell, to be redeemed on/near one of the Online Holiday Paydays
- Using your blog to promote your holiday products and send traffic directly to your store
- If you sell on eBay, regularly updating your eBay Stores Promotion boxes with new merchandise
- Creating a video review of a few of your top holiday products for posting on YouTube.
Millions of people search YouTube and the web this time of year for gift ideas and product reviews. A good product review video hosted on YouTube can also land a first page ranking on Google for the long tail keywords of the product you are reviewing!
As you can see, there are many different ways you can get the word out about your online store! You don’t have to do them all. Pick one and get started today!
Promotions. Schedule new promotions to start and end on these top online holiday paydays. Shoppers will either land at your store ready to make a decision (in which case a promotion ending on that date can spur them to buy today!) or they are at the start of the buying process, and a brand new promotion will keep your store front and center in their mind.
Price Awareness. Online product prices can be very volatile the last three weeks of the holiday selling season. Make sure that your products are priced and position appropriately to generate sales and maximize profit margins.
Shipping Options. If you’re not offering express shipping options at this point in the game, do so knowing that it will hurt your late in the season holiday sales. The #1 thing buyers want to know once the clock strikes December is that they’ll receive their purchase in time. Especially if it’s a hot item that’s running out of stock in stores. If you’re not offering express shipping options, you’ll likely lose the sale to someone who is.
Provide Real-Time Customer Service. This can be a tough one for solopreneurs who are busy shipping, marketing and more! But providing real-time customer service during the holidays can also make the difference between getting the sale or losing it. Customers who don’t get their product questions answered right away will go in search of a store who will.
As soon as their product ships, notify your customer and provide a tracking number. An added customer benefit is to follow up with an “Your Item Has Been Delivered Email”. With shoppers making multiple purchases online, you want to make sure that they know the item has been delivered to them. Shipping services like FedEx can actually be configured to notify the customer directly via email with shipping notifications, delivery exceptions and confirmed delivery.
Amazon FBA. It’s still not too late to outsource your fulfillment, express shipping and customer service to Amazon FBA (Fulfillment by Amazon). Whether your sell on Amazon or use Amazon Multi-Channel fulfillment, outsourcing the time-consuming process of order fulfillment so you can focus on product marketing and visibility is one of the best ways to generate bigger Online Holiday Paydays!
If history repeats itself, Monday, December 5th will be our next biggest Online Holiday Payday of the season! By using the steps above, you’ll be sure to make it a good one!
-Lisa
by Lisa Suttora on November 27, 2011
November 26th is Small Business Saturday.
The day when millions of shoppers “Pledge to Shop Small”.
As we cover in the Holiday Selling Guide, this is the day to remind people on Facebook, Twitter and in your email marketing that it’s Small Business Saturday and let them know about YOUR online store and what you are offering for the holidays!
American Express started the Small Business Saturday initiative in 2010.
Already more than 2 million people have Liked the Small Business Saturday Facebook page. Go over there and Like it, share it and reference the promotion in your marketing today!
While Small Business Saturday was originally started for local small businesses, independent online merchants should also leverage consumer awareness of this promotion.
Small Business Saturday received a lot of media attention this year. MSN.com has featured the Small Business Saturday promotion in the upper right hand corner of their homepage all day today.
Run Your Promotion or Promote a Product
If you have a promotion ready to go for Small Business Saturday, spend today Tweeting it, Facebooking it and also send a special email to your customers.
If you don’t have a promotion ready, pick one of your best [click to continue reading…]
by Lisa Suttora on November 24, 2011
10 years ago this month I walked away from a very successful career in corporate America with a dream to become a successful online business owner.
Looking back on it now, as a single parent with a 4 month old and a 4 year old, it was a pretty gutsy thing to do.
The “how” wasn’t clear to me when I made that decision.
But the “why” was very clear.
I wanted to be able to run an online business from my home and have the flexibility to be as hands on in my kid’s lives as possible. I also had a lifelong fire burning inside of me to be an entrepreneur.
So for me, not only is every Thanksgiving a celebration of blessings, it’s also a celebration of entrepreneurship.
Your “Why”
And I know that each and every one of you have your own [click to continue reading…]
by Lisa Suttora on November 6, 2011
As ecommerce competition heats up, great product sourcing skills are the name of the game for online success.
While Marketing skills and knowing how to sell your products online are also of paramount importance, without in-demand products to sell,your business won’t get off the ground or thrive.
The best marketing in the world won’t sell a product that people don’t want.
Fortunately, there are millions of products to sell online, with new products coming into the marketplace every day.
Product innovation is moving at a more rapid pace than ever before in history. And global reach has opened up untapped pools of buyers hungry for products in marketplaces that are saturated here in the U.S.
In this three-part series, I’m going to explain how Amazon customers shop, give you tips and strategies for sourcing great products to sell on Amazon and options for places to source them.
In part-one we’ll look at “Understanding the Amazon Customer”.
Understanding the Amazon Customer
With 44% year-over-year retail growth, Amazon is known for [click to continue reading…]
by Lisa Suttora on October 31, 2011
Think Halloween products only sell in the month’s before October 31st? Not if you sell online!
In the online world, Halloween themed products sell all year long.
Whether for kid’s dress-up play, a themed costume party, a local school drama club production or the
Halloween collectibles shopper, the only place you can off-season Halloween products is online.
Seasonal Halloween sales are a $7 billion dollar industry, reports the National Retail Federation.
But off-season sales are strong all year long.
According to Terapeak Research, more than $2 million dollars worth of Halloween products were sold on eBay between Nov 1, 2010 and January 31, 2011.
Another 1.9 million in Halloween product sales happened [click to continue reading…]
by Lisa Suttora on October 24, 2011
With exactly two months to go until December 24th, for online merchants, it’s showtime!
And even if you’ve been meticulously planning for the holiday selling season, there are so many details involved, it’s easy to inadvertently make common mistakes that can derail your holiday sales.
Don’t let these 7 mistakes be the Grinch that steals your [click to continue reading…]
by Lisa Suttora on September 29, 2011
The holiday selling season is filled with possibility for online merchants!
The biggest selling season of the year, last year’s holiday season boasted the first BILLION dollar online sales day ever!
And this year online holiday sales are expected to increase by another 11%! All indicators point to the biggest online selling season to date.
In fact…
Holiday sales are already happening!
- 39% of holiday shoppers started their holiday shopping in September
- Major e-tailers have been promoting holiday products since Sept. 1st
- Holiday shoppers are buying more holiday items earlier than ever before
- Online shoppers are making their holiday purchases in a very specific way
- There are more ways than ever for this year to maximize your holiday sales
That’s the good news!
The bad news is that possibility won’t automatically turn into profits, unless you take the right actions.
- Unfortunately many online merchants get bogged down during the holiday season… .
- Spending valuable time on holiday selling “to-do’s” that don’t generate the best results.
- While ignoring the tactics and strategies that do!
And that’s why I created this brand new MP3 Audio “Ten Holiday Do’s and Don’ts to Make This Your Best Online Holiday Selling Season Ever!”
To cut through the holiday frenzy, and show you ten simple things you can do make more holiday sales this year!
Make no mistake, holiday profits don’t come to those who leave their holiday sales to chance!
So if you’re ready to skyrocket your holiday sales, pick up a copy of “Ten Holiday Do’s and Don’ts” and make this your best holiday selling season ever!
by Lisa Suttora on September 14, 2011
One of the big challenges that smaller online merchants have is tapping into suppliers for super-hot, name-brand, in-demand, in-season inventory.
There’s not a week that goes by that I don’t received emails from people asking how they can get access to supplier names for the latest gadgets, in-season fashions, designer shoes and handbags or the latest and greatest hot toy .
But the issue is not in getting the supplier names. That’s the easy part! The issue is that many big name brand suppliers (i.e. Apple, Nike, Microsoft, UGG ) won’t sell directly to you.
Case in point… this week’s launch of the [click to continue reading…]
by Lisa Suttora on August 18, 2011
Running an ecommerce business costs money.
Whether it’s buying a new computer with faster processing capabilities, sourcing new inventory so you can sell more and make more, updating your workspace to make it more efficient or, bringing in project based help to get your holiday inventory listed…
It takes money to grow.
Unfortunately for small (and especially home-based, online businesses) the availability of growth-captial is in short supply. Especially from traditional sources such as banks and credit cards.
Enter Kabbage, an Atlanta based company with one goal – “Funding for your online business.”
Kabbage provides [click to continue reading…]
by Lisa Suttora on August 3, 2011
Ever since I introduced our new 2-part series on “How to Integrate Amazon into Your Business Model”, the #1 question I’ve received is about what to sell on Amazon…
“Lisa, I’m interested in selling on Amazon, but I don’t have a niche. (Or my niche is not represented on Amazon.) Do I need a niche FIRST to sell successfully on Amazon?”
It’s a really good question and the answer may surprise you… [click to continue reading…]
