Top Website Ecommerce Hosting Shopping Cart Merchant Guidelines
Saturday, October 24th, 2009This is the period when top website ecommerce hosting shopping cart providers report an increase in sign-ups as well.
So what do you need to do to get ready for the virtual holiday crowd?..
Before we go further into store preparations, here are a few more enchanting notes about holiday shopping:
* Men outspend women by as much as 15% during holiday shopping
* Rural shoppers are more likely to visit online stores than urban shoppers
* Consumers search for characteristics rather than prices
Keep those points in mind as we go on to store preparations.
Product & Packaging
It seems lifeless, but it’s really true: customers usually look for presents this time of the year. Now, you can’t switch your products but you can alter the way you package and market them to accommodate customer needs. Digital cameras, portable MP3 players and watches make fantastic gifts and are usually hot items for the holiday season.
But what happens if, for example, you own an online shoe store? It gets a bit tricky because shoes don’t actually come across as natural gifts, and a number of brands measure sizes differently, making shopping for shoes for someone else a bit of an art. So how about selling unique holiday gift certificates, complete with holiday packaging? Make sure the designs for men and women are one of a kind but equally appealing.
However, most shoe stores do allow exchanges for different sizes. Therefore, you can still work on making the packaging as captivating as possible so that you are able to trade your products as bona fide holiday gifts.
SEO & Marketing
Once you have an idea of what the market wants with regard to your products, you need to make certain your site is fully optimized with all the necessary keywords (What does this mean? We’re not going to go into this here, but check out our other posts about keyword research and usage for more information). Therefore, you should go all-out with your marketing campaign to take full gain of this once-a-year buying phenomenon (well, of course there are other holiday periods throughout the year, but the year-end holidays are still when most shopping is done).
Make sure you make full use of the tools your hosted shopping cart has to offer such as newsletter broadcasting, a basic piece of shopping cart technology. Many top website ecommerce hosting shopping cart providers offer this feature for free. Start the ball rolling with your current customers by enticing them with recommend-a-friend deals, invitation-only discounts, early bird promotions and tie-ins.
And just because the holidays are over does not mean the shopping season is over. The only thing shoppers love more than holiday sales is post-holiday sales. Referring to the results of statistics, over 60% of shoppers make purchases during this period. So be sure you are ready for that. As a matter of fact, if you were a bit late with your holiday prep, you can still make up for it by gearing up your store for post-holiday sales.
Reminder
With all the excitement (and maybe even panic while you ruminate over the points presented above) in the air, its easy to miss out on one very important factor - the inventory level. Make sure that the items you are heavily promoting are sufficiently stocked. If you are using the services of a drop shipper, be sure you have enough stock during this period. You must give this special attention because your drop shipper might be shipping the same products for other merchants as well. Not being able to provide what your customers have ordered before the holidays will cost you customers and any hope of future sales, so ensure that you have enough inventory.












