The holiday season is officially here, which means millions of consumers will be spending more cash to buy those gifts.
If you are one of those small business owners, you should capitalise on the holiday shopping trend by creating a sound online marketing strategy. Doing so will allow you to reach more customers and generate more sales. Here are four areas you need to improve (if you haven’t) in order to maximise your profit during holiday sale season.
1. MOBILE-FRIENDLY WEBSITE
Don’t make the mistake of focusing your marketing efforts strictly on desktop visitors. Failure to cater to the ever-growing demographic of mobile users may cost you tons of sales. 54% of consumers plan to shop for products this holiday season on their smartphone or mobile device. Mobile devices are now faster and more powerful than ever, allowing consumers to buy products with just a few basic steps.
With the holiday season fast approaching, there’s no better time than now to optimise your online store for a higher conversion rate. If you’re site isn’t mobile friendly yet, depending on the size of your store, you may still have time to convert your website to a responsive mobile friendly design. If you have a large store and most of your orders take place over the holiday season, you may want to wait until the new year before taking on that challenge.
2. GOOGLE PRODUCT ADS
Not to be confused with Google AdWords, Product Listing Ads are another self-serving ad type offered by the search engine giant. They differ from PPC ads like keyword search or display ads in several different ways: PLAs are designed specifically for products, making them particularly effective for the holiday season, and they contain more information than standard AdWords keyword ads. Furthermore, PLAs display a picture of the product alongside the listing, drawing more attention to your ads. Assuming you sell a physical product and not a service, consider using PLAs as part of your online marketing strategy this holiday season.
3. VIDEO CONTENT
The same Thing With Google report cited above also found that consumers are planning to spend more time watching product videos this holiday season. Whether it’s a live demonstration on how a product works, or a video review by another customers, video has become an integral component in consumers’ shopping decisions. As such, business owners should include video in their marketing strategy, posting relevant videos to YouTube.
4. SOCIAL MEDIA
Of course, social media should also be a part of your marketing strategy for the holidays. More people use social media during the holidays than any other time of year. This means an even larger audience, which should help to generate sales, will see your posts. Try posting a combination of both informative and promotional material on social media, keeping your content diversified enough so that it doesn’t deter people from following your accounts. Social media marketing for the holiday season can be a great strategy for local retailers as well as online retailers.