When it comes to Christmas, there is no such thing as starting too early. Brick and mortar shops are getting the decorations out, why shouldn’t online stores follow suit? Gearing up for Christmas means you can better prepare your business for the “silly season” and be one of the first online stores to grab the attention of your specific Christmas shopping market.

In retail, Black Friday and Cyber Monday warm up shoppers for the grand finale of the year: Christmas, which is traditionally the busiest and most revenue-generating time of the year. That means everyone with something to sell will be “bringing it” and doing it sooner rather than later. Are you ready?

3 Things to Do Right Now:

1. Strategise
Now isn’t the time to recycle last year’s campaigns or do what everyone else is doing. Think of a strategy that will really resonate with your target audience and customer base. A brainstorming session with your team could be a good idea.

Some pointers:

Learn from last year: Which products did the best? Which approaches worked well? Were there any shortcomings on your part? How can you improve on service?
Stock up! Make sure you will have enough of everything. Will you be ready when demand picks up?
Will you be needing more hands-on deck at some point? Will your hosting package and other IT infrastructure systems cope with an increase of website visitors and online shoppers?
Update your website. Add topical banners and group gift ideas for ease of shopping i.e. Gifts for Dad, Gifts for Girls, Gifts for Gran etc.

2. Ramp up Marketing
Over the next couple of months your products and promotions need to be MORE visible on social media platforms, in your customers’ email boxes and in search results. So, whatever you have been doing, ramp it up slightly. Engage more and increase your advertising budgets.

Tips:

Consider running a competition/give-away on social media
Create and schedule all your marketing efforts for the next several weeks to free up time and keep the momentum going.

3. Build/grow an Email List

Email marketing can be your business’s best friend this Christmas. Emails have a longer lifespan than posts in a social feed, it is a more personal and direct approach, and it helps you forge relationships with a targeted and interested group of leads. Build or grow your subscriber lists now.

Try this:

Make subscribing to your mailing list the call to action everywhere: on social media, on your email signature and on every blog post.
Create fun and engaging pop-ups on your website that encourage signing up.
Incentivise with a 10-15% discount promo on the next purchase.
Give email subscribers exclusivity on products and promos and advocate this fact to encourage more sign-ups.

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