Customer Engagement Online Strategies during the Holidays

The holiday season is one of the busiest shopping times of the year. Every year, millions of people jump online to find the best deals of the holiday season. Major events like Black Friday and Cyber Monday bring in a staggering amount of business every year. Black Friday in 2018 pulled in $6.22 billion in online sales alone. That is 23.6% more than 2017, a new record high according to Adobe Analytics. Black Friday 2018 also saw over $2 billion in sales from only smartphones. There is a significant amount of money to be made during the holiday season, but that means every business will be competing for every customer. In online retail, there is even more competition, as the Internet is international. It is important to keep your customers engaged lest they decide to shop somewhere else. Fortunately, there are strategies to keep your customers engaged during the online holiday shopping season.

Seasonal Features and Deals

The holiday season is the time to pull out all the stops. Customers are on the lookout for the best deals of the holiday season so make sure your deals are worth paying attention to. If you are running a special sale for the holidays, let your customers know. Send out an email newsletter, post on social media, and update your website to notify customers that there is a special holiday deal. A good deal doesn’t only mean discounts on products either. A special shipping discount or a guarantee that orders placed before a certain date will arrive before Christmas are deals worth advertising.

Be careful not to create superfluous, haphazard, or pointless discounts. Customers are smart and can determine if they are getting a good deal or are being played. If you are going to offer a discount or a special shipping rate make sure it is a worthwhile deal. A “sale” that is not worth will only push customers to shop elsewhere. Put yourself in your customer’s shoes when designing holiday sales to ensure you are not wasting your time and driving customers away.

Mobile Optimization

As noted above, a large percentage of online holiday sales come from mobile. Adobe Analytics estimates that mobile devices accounted for 31% of all revenue between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday in 2018. In order to keep customers on your site, it is important that your website is mobile-friendly. Nothing will make a customer click to a different site faster than a poorly optimized mobile experience.

A good mobile experience is more than a responsive website, though a quick loading site is important. A mobile-friendly website requires a different layout than a desktop site. Mobile devices have far less screen to work with, and websites need to accommodate that limitation. Mobile websites need to be easy to read on a smaller screen and customers need to be able to enlarge pictures easily. Many elements go into creating a mobile-optimized site, and there are numerous online resources to help you create a good mobile experience.

Faster Processes

Everyone is running out of time during the holidays. There are so many things that need to be done before the year ends, so give your customers the gift of time. Any time you can shave off of the shopping process helps to lower the barrier to purchase. You and your customers want as few obstacles in the buying process as possible. Some steps are unavoidable, but consider taking out extra steps at least during the holidays. You may want to collect customer data during checkout, but taking those collection fields out will decrease the number of abandoned shopping carts.

Holiday Cheer

If you walk through a mall during the holidays you will see holiday decorations covering storefronts. There is no reason an online store can’t decorate as well. Consider adding holiday flair to your company logo or social media icons. Adding holiday decorations to your website helps put customers in the shopping mood which potentially increases sales.

The holidays can be a very profitable time of year for businesses, especially online stores. If you want a portion of the revenue, your business needs to engage customers and keep them on your site. Worthwhile seasonal deals will attract customers to your site. A good mobile site and minimal barriers to purchase will increase the number of completed transactions. Decorating your online storefront will spread holiday cheer and put customers in the gifting mood. With these tips and tricks, your business will keep customers engaged and satisfied this holiday season.