The views expressed by the business participants are their own.
As the holiday shopping season approaches, which usually lasts from November 1 to December 31, the question arises: how can you make the most of this time? Its peak will come during the so-called Cyber Five, or Cyber Week, which can bring in 16.9% of all holiday season revenue.
Let’s take a look at some strategies that will help you get through this busy time and keep the transition going into the future.
Related: Increase Your Ecommerce Sales – 8 Proven Strategies for the Holiday Season
1. Maintain healthy margins while customers save
Instead of offering blanket discounts, a tiered discount system based on cart value encourages larger purchases. Offering different discount levels encourages customers to spend more to maximize their savings, which improves average order value (AOV).
For example, offer 10% off a $50 order, 20% off a $100 order, etc. By maximizing sales opportunities, sales of high-margin products reduce the impact on overall profits. For example, show clients complementary items to increase the total order value, such as adding a phone case to a smartphone to reach $500 and unlock a 15% discount. This spreads the discount across all products, balancing costs while customers enjoy savings.
Another way is to sell high margin bundles at small discounts. Offer complementary or related items to the main product so that the customer reaches a specified order amount to receive a discount. Customers realize they are getting a deal, but higher margin products help offset the cost. Finally, use behavioral data of your consumers to provide real-time incentives. For example, you can set up a personalized pop-up that appears after the user has viewed a few products, suggesting orders over $100 for a 20% off coupon on their next purchase. This keeps current margins reasonable while encouraging repeat purchases.
2. Promote special offers beyond early access
Providing early access to BFCM can drive subscriptions, grow your subscriber list and lower customer acquisition costs. Greater value from early access motivates a prospect to convert to a customer when sales begin and maintains customer loyalty. You have a win-win situation:
- Customers are more likely to find what they want without being ‘on sale.’
- You will drive traffic to your website.
- Your brand benefits by increasing engagement, which can turn into loyalty.
Early access is a strong draw in itself, but you can further incentivize registration with additional benefits. The average cart abandonment rate is 82%, and 62% of consumers cite high shipping costs as the main reason for this. The higher the order value, the less willing people will pay for delivery: 19% will not pay for an order of €15, 27% for €50, and 35% for €150. A well-timed banner that offers free shipping on orders over a certain threshold, displayed when the customer is about to check out, can be both cost-effective and very attractive to customers.
Additionally, offering early Black Friday access to your most active customers or loyalty members strengthens relationships with your most valuable audience of a lifetime. A sense of choice and urgency will encourage your customers to take advantage of the ‘not everyone’ option as quickly as possible. An example of this approach is the LEGO or Sephora Insiders programs.
Related: How to Attract High Quality Customers
3. Gamified shopping: delight visitors and improve more conversions
Gamification adds interaction and a sense of reward to the shopping process, increasing engagement and encouraging visitors to spend more time on your site. Winning discounts, collecting loyalty program points, or participating in challenges improves conversion rates, increases AOV and reduces cart abandonment.
Gamification is about adding game-like elements to the normal shopping process. A common example of ecommerce gamification is the pop-up wheel of fortune. Claspo data shows that the Spin the Wheel pop-up has a 41% higher conversion rate than countdown pop-ups. You can offer various incentives in the tire sector, such as discounts, free shipping, gifts or festive packaging. With an advanced rewards management system, you can set winning odds for each reward – for example, 55% with 10% discount, 30% gift, and 15% free shipping – allowing you to manage your rewards pool effectively within yourself. the budget.
This interactive element keeps consumers engaged, while the uncertainty of the reward increases the happiness of the winners within. As an advanced strategy, behavioral data can be used to trigger only when needed, when users are about to checkout or abandon the cart, encouraging them to complete the purchase with a special discount.
Related: 7 Ways to Improve Customer Retention Using Email Gamification
4. Flash deals and the excitement of the countdown: create FOMO
Black Friday is already a limited-time event, but you can trigger FOMO with flash sales. The very limited duration of such promotions creates a sense of urgency and scarcity among consumers, pushing them to make quick purchase decisions. This approach is effective in generating interest in high-demand products and clearing seasonal inventory.
Flash sales trigger FOMO, which is a strong psychological motivator, and push browsers to make quick purchase decisions. Timed promotions or hourly flash sales encourage shoppers to check your site throughout the day to catch the latest deals. Also, you can launch mystery sales by keeping the assortment a secret, which is especially powerful during BF when shoppers are waiting for limited-time or special deals.
Before the sale, encourage visitors to leave their emails to be notified first, and during the event, display a banner with a timer to let them know about the ongoing promotion and countdown to the end. Our clients have found that banners with timers and attractive offers can increase conversions by 112%. As an advanced strategy, A/B testing can be used to identify the most effective times for flash sales based on customer engagement data.
5. Put user experience first
With 48% of consumers doing extensive research on products before making a purchase and 62% of consumers saying they are more likely to buy a product after seeing it, accessibility of information is important. Enhance product pages with user-generated content such as customer photos or videos from reviews and social media. Notably, this type of content is often not available on many sites, so there is potential for growth and conversion.
Another way to improve the user experience is by using informative cookies, especially for new visitors. For example, if your Black Friday deals are limited to certain products only, a pop-up or sticky bar to inform users about the promotion ensures that shoppers don’t miss out. One of our clients found that cross-promotional hacks increased cart additions by 15% and increased sales by 19%.
Essential last-minute tricks
Small actions taken early can yield big results, and the impact will last through the holiday season. Ideally, Black Friday preparations would have started in the summer, but there is still time to get things going. Google data shows that in December, consumers complete less than half of their planned holiday shopping, which means there are still opportunities to capture more sales, even after BFCM. Capture first-time buyers with early bird access, re-target buyers who have shown interest but haven’t converted by playing games, and engage returning visitors with special deals.
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