Ideas to maximise your Christmas Ecommerce selling
Topics: Ecommerce
With Ecommerce sales rising year on year how can you improve your Ecommerce Website to maximise your sales at this time of year.
Mobile – Does your Website work on Mobile Devices?
In a recent study, Neilsen Social found that over 80% of TV viewers are using a second screen at the same time. Mobile continues to see massive growth and has also fuelled ‘showrooming’ where consumers will ‘price compare’ on their mobile device whilst in-store, then purchase later via their desktop. Media consumption today is across multiple devices. With these figures in mind it’s important not to ignore this medium and ensure you have a responsive website or mobile website which works across all mobile devices.
Plan your Sales Campaigns, Offer Sales Discounts and Promotions
Offer incentives throughout the Christmas period to continually encourage and maximise the sell opportunities. Give your promotions and discounts a timescale ie offer ends Midnight tomorrow etc to encourage the customer to ‘buy now’.
Improve your Checkout Process to prevent checkout abandonment
Think about how your checkout process works. Can it be made easier? Do you force people to sign up for an account? Should you be offering a guest checkout as well? Look at your sales funnel, where are they dropping out in the buying timeline? What about follow up emails for people leaving products in their basket? Simple things like incorporating a post code look up has been shown to reduce checkout abandonment by speeding up the checkout process and reducing errors.
Show your Ecommerce website is a ‘trusted website’
It’s important for your customers to feel confident and safe when buying from you. If they don’t they will click away. Include logos and banners of your payment providers and include information that promotes that feeling of trust when buying from your online store.
Also make your site run securely via HTTPs and bear in mind that Google now rank 'secure' websites higher than non-secure websites which is an added bonus.
Decorate your online store - Make it Christmassy!
Add Christmas banners throughout your ecommerce website. Promote your Christmas Delivery dates, add banners of your Top Selling Products and promote your offers and deals. It’s a good idea to state when your offers will expire as this stimulates a call to action.
Organise your products, Offer Gift Sets, Offer Gift Wrapping
Make it quick and easy for the customer to shop and buy. Bundle similar products together to not only make it easier for the customer to buy but also encourages larger basket order values.
Offering a Gift Wrapping service at this time of year is a good idea, imagine receiving your item all gift wrapped saving you the job!
Review SEO of your Main Pages and Best Sellers
You need to make sure that your main pages and product pages are being picked up by Google. Can they be improved? It is important to review your SEO reguarly.
Review the titles, Meta descriptions and ensure all the pages and product pages have the relevant information and keywords for Google to pick up.
Shipping & Returns
If you don’t already, consider offering Free Shipping or Free Shipping if ordering over a certain value, for the Christmas period. According to a recent survey, four in five consumers see free shipping as an important factor when shopping online.
Suggest they spend £-- to quality for Free shipping, this is a way of improving your basket order value. A UPS study showed that 58% of customers have added extra items to their shopping basket in order to qualify for free delivery. Ensure your returns policy is clear and not hidden on the site.
Delivery - Click and collect
According to Econsultancy, 45% of UK online consumers used click-and-collect for their Christmas shopping – this shows that Ecommerce websites need to cater to customer demand for convenient delivery services. Separate data published on the Econsultancy blog shows that problems with delivery options and costs are among the most common causes of basket abandonment. A recent survey also found that 50% of respondents had abandoned a purchase online due to unsatisfactory delivery options.
Click and Collect has previously been out of the reach of the SME marketplace and has previously only been provided by the large retailers such as Argos, however working with GFS, Electric Media are able to offer this cost effective, delivery option to SME Ecommerce retailers via our Ecommerce Platform.
Tell your Customers via Email Marketing and Social media
Don’t forget to tell your customers about your Christmas Discounts and offers! You want to tell as many people as possible, you want to really spread your net wide.
Be creative with your content, write killer, informative blogs about your best selling products and why people are buying them. Plan an Email Marketing campaign and tell them about your offers and when the offer is ending. Also use Social Media to speak to your customers quickly and easily and get your messages across. Remember to engage them, the aim is to entice them to buy.
Plan for your Christmas Ecommerce success
This is by no means an exhaustive list but some great tips to help you maximise your Ecommerce selling this Christmas.
Electric Media Bristol would love to help you. Contact us or call us today on 0845 6171117 to discuss your Christmas ideas and plans in greater detail.