Seasonal e-commerce strategies that bring in sales during the 2021 holiday season. The rivalry for the best e-commerce Christmas setup is like the contest for the best tearjerker ad, always tough.
However, we all know that the e-commerce advertising landscape is now more competitive than ever. In some parts of the world, physical stores may still be closed or operating with a drop off service.
Even if your country isn’t on some form of lockdown, most people have had over a year to get used to e-commerce and experience the simplicity of doing your seasonal shopping online.
A few fast and ingenious preparations are all it takes to turn your Shopify store into a seasonal sales driver.
Here are Seasonal eCommerce Strategies to increase sales in the 2021 Holiday Season:
Before we start, be sure to check out our Black Friday Cyber Monday eCommerce Checklist.
Seasonal Shopify Store Homepage
We’re all hoping for an attractive offer to spark a present idea when we’re on the search for Christmas gifts. Similarly, when it comes to how shops sell their items to holiday buyers, Christmas is a time when most stores throw out the red carpet.
Your homepage is a terrific area to highlight the best of the finest Christmas deals so that your customers see them as soon as they enter your site. Whether you’re including a list of tempting specials or not, whether you’re focusing on a hero deal or a series of offers, make sure this information is displayed on key pages of your site so that your customers don’t miss out.
Struggling for seasonal homepage ideas? Check out if your homepage is BFCM ready.
Category pages and in-stock products
The first rule of successful Category page usage is to avoid wasting space. Because the amount of space on this page is restricted, it’s important that you make the most of it.
We suggest hiding your “out of stock” products. This is critical for the purchasing experience: Nothing is more off-putting to a shopper looking for the right gift than searching through pages and pages of out-of-stock items.
Even worse is going on a Category page via a paid ad and discovering that everything advertised in the ad has sold out. That traffic will, without a doubt, bounce. Meaning you’ve wasted ad spend and haven’t even got a conversion for it.
Promoting the products that are most likely to enhance conversion, followed by moving your most reviewed products to the top of the page, is another excellent use of Category page space. This strategy serves a dual purpose: not only are you marketing the items that customers interact with the most, but you’re also increasing social proof by demonstrating to potential customers that your products have been tried and true.
It’s a great idea to make a gift category and collection in your store so it’s very clear for people that your products can be gifted. You can take this further by getting more specific on who the gifts are for such as husband, daughter baby and so on.
Tip: You can also organise by price bands such as ‘Under $25,’ ‘$25 – $50,’ etc.
Make all information available to shoppers
Ever gifted someone something and it doesn’t fit? Wasn’t the right colour? Or the worst! Turned up late?
When your consumers are browsing your site, there are some things you don’t want them to miss, such as the last potential date to order and get merchandise before Christmas.
Be sure to clearly outline shipping and return info prior to purchase.
Make it impossible for your customers to miss out on their last chance to place an order on your website! Display these messages on several pages of your site to keep them in front of customers, including the home page, PDPs, and checkout page.
Knowing that shipping before Christmas is an option may be enough to persuade your last-minute shoppers to complete their purchase and choose your store over a competitor.
Seasonal Gift Guides on Shopify
Ever stuck for what to get someone? Quite a lot of consumers spend time reading guides, watching reviews and generally searching for what to get their friends and family.
Gift guides are a great way to show off your products and increase conversions. Because you’re not going for the direct sale and you’re providing a bit of a guide for your visitors, they’re more likely to convert as they don’t feel as though they’re being sold to.
According to Shopify, 40% of U.S. consumers begin researching their holiday shopping by the time November rolls around. Whilst that stat may be a bit old now, the numbers have probably increased due to the popularity of online shopping.
Gift with Purchase
Coming straight out of BFCM and offering a free gift with purchase over a particular threshold of spend going through the rest of December has proven to be a huge success for our clients year after year.
This raises the average order value and provides an excellent opportunity to give a free gift to help boost the AOV. It’s also a good idea to make the threshold higher than your free shipping threshold, for a double whammy effect.
When you have an offer like this, it’s critical to make it obvious and consistent across all of your advertising efforts, product text, banners, and other materials so that it’s crystal clear that people may take advantage of it.
It’s also critical to thoroughly test any custom code you’re writing to ensure that your checkout is functioning properly, as errors can occur! It’s ideal to go live and conduct your testing during low-traffic hours, such as early in the morning.
Tip: Choose a lightweight gift with a high perceived value and something that won’t add on to your shipping cost!
Easy to claim offers
Having any discounts and coupons automatically applied makes it much easier for consumers to take advantage of your deal. It’s also a good idea to verify your product page wording for any misleading or contradictory offers from past periods and make it very clear in your site banner and email pop-up that no coupon code is required to claim whatever offer it is.
Tip: Make sure to double-check your banners (hint hint: mobile) on all devices to make sure they look good!
Upsells & Cross-Sells
Don’t overlook the opportunity to upsell or cross-sell comparable products to your consumers. People are in a shopping frenzy, whether it’s for themselves or as gifts. As long as your product is complimentary and the offer is appealing, your upsell conversion rate should rise. Make it as appealing to the senses as possible.
Tip: We love the Bold Product Upsell app for this!
Want to scale your e-commerce store and increase conversions throughout the holiday season and beyond?
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