If you're like most eCommerce businesses, the holiday season is the busiest time of year, which means taking on seasonal employees and rushing to get deals advertised in time to bring in more sales. With more customers flooding your website in search of the best deals and highest quality products, you'll be happy when it's all over, and you get to sit back and count your sales. Unfortunately, you can't rely on holiday sales to keep you in business year-round; you'll need to drive sales after the holiday season. Here's how.
Check Your Website Health
You should always update your website to deal with the increase in website traffic during the holiday season. However, you should also be able to handle website traffic after the holidays have ended. Your customers require fast and simple shopping experiences all year, so slow loading speed and complicated navigation will cost your business customers when the holiday season has ended.
During the holiday season, many people expect eCommerce websites to be slow because they understand there is an influx of traffic. However, that understanding doesn't stop them from going somewhere else, but they may be more reasonable and willing to wait a few seconds longer for a website to load. However, after the holiday season, people expect fast loading times.
Once the holiday season has officially ended, look at your site's health and speed. You may need to update the design for new marketing campaigns and run tests to ensure fast load times.
Clear Inventory
Knowing how much inventory to order can be difficult during the holiday season. If you've purchased too much, you may have excess stock. Once the holidays have ended, you should clear out any old inventory and open up space for new products. Of course, you can always put holiday inventory under a section of your website where people can find deals.
You can also clear inventory by building items together or offering free gifts to customers who spend a stated amount on your website.
Send a Post-Holiday Email
During the holiday season, your customers' inboxes are flooded with marketing emails that they've probably ignored or only read the ones they knew they needed. After the holidays, customers will continue to check their emails, but they'll now be looking for post-holiday deals. You can take advantage of this consumer behavior by sending emails highlighting discounts long after the holidays have come and gone.
Stay Active on Social
While you might have ramped up your social media marketing during the holidays to help your brand stick out, you shouldn't slow down just because the holidays are over. Keeping up on social media can help you attract new customers and retain current ones to ensure you can boost sales even after the holiday season.
Remember to consistently engage with your customers by commenting on their posts and encouraging them to post images of products on your social media pages. You can also do a social media giveaway, which can help you get rid of any lingering inventory.
Try a Retargeting Campaign
A retargeting campaign is a paid ads campaign that can help you bring customers back after the holiday rush. You can run a retargeting campaign on social media or use Google Ads to help you target customers who have already visited your website during the holiday season. You can also use email marketing for retargeting customers who have purchased or signed up for email marketing on your website.
Start a Sale
Offering new post-holiday discounts can help you incentivize customers to keep shopping long after they've purchased and returned gifts. You can also get rid of old inventory by having a huge sale on holiday-related products. You can also try something new and accept cryptocurrency as a method of payment or exchange.
Consider the New Year
Once the shopping holidays are over, there is still one more important holiday you can use to your benefit: New Year. Many people make new year's resolutions to help them become healthier and make better choices in the coming months. You can market to the individuals who have resolutions by appealing to their need to make a change in their lives. For example, you can create deals to promote a "new year, new office" campaign if you sell office supplies.
Piggyback Off the Holidays
There's a lot going on during the holidays that you can use to piggyback off of. For example, many people purchase cars for their loved ones during the holidays, which car insurance companies can use to promote their deals. However, eCommerce businesses can also piggyback off of holiday shopping trends. For example, most people eat a lot during the holidays and plan to start a diet in January. If you sell health products, now is the best time to promote products that can help people lose their holiday pounds.
Release a New Product
Another great way to bring visitors to your website is to release a new product after the holidays. Since many businesses will still be selling the same products they sold in the month of December, you can release a new product and start creating a buzz as soon as possible. In addition, releasing a new product can help you reach customers looking for something new in the coming year.
Of course, if you plan on releasing a new product after the holidays, you'll need to plan for it months in advance. Your new product release preparations will need to occur during the holiday season, so it might not be best for every business since many small businesses will need to focus on fulfilling current customer needs and managing the traffic increase.
Don't Disappear
Many eCommerce businesses use the first few months after the holidays to restock inventory and don't focus on continuing to sell products online. Instead of disappearing after the holidays have gone, continue to communicate and build relationships with the customers you gained during the holiday season. Disappearing means being forgotten, so even if someone loves your product, they'll soon get bombarded with emails and advertisements from your competitors if you don't keep communicating with them.