Deals Day: Is Your Online Business Ready For The Busiest Shopping Week Of The Year?

With Black Friday and Cyber Monday now marking the beginning of an entire week of desperate shopping, both in time for Christmas and just because the deals on offer tend to be enormous, it's important to ensure that your online retail business is adequately prepared for the busiest shopping week of the entire year.

For many businesses, the week of Black Friday and Cyber Monday can be thought of as an early Christmas. Some shoppers buying a solid 90% of their Christmas gifts over a few short days!

However, throughout the week, but particularly on Cyber Monday, it is only those businesses with user-friendly, intuitive and contemporary eCommerce solutions in place that will truly feel the benefits of this tidal wave of consumerism.

Are Your Ecommerce Solutions Really Ready For The Busiest Shopping Week Of The Year?

1. Are You Prepared For Increased Traffic? – Every year, the week around Black Friday and Cyber Monday translates to a massive influx of traffic, particularly if the deals have been advertised a few days beforehand.
   
   Ensuring that your eCommerce Solutions can handle the increased traffic without crashing is hugely important to making a success of the busiest week in retail. Investing in a dedicated server can ensure that your site stays up throughout the stress of Cyber Monday; it may seem like a waste of money, particularly if your site has never crashed before, but any downtime on Cyber Monday can result in lost transactions and hundreds of pounds wasted on other businesses, instead of your own.
   
2. Does Your Website's Design Reflect The Date? – By customising your eCommerce solutions' graphics and the design of the landing page, you can help to build both excitement and a sense of urgency, resulting in a higher conversion rate.
   
   By letting your customers know that specific deal will not last forever, you can tap into that urgency which brick-and-mortar retail stores dominate on Black Friday. The mentality that 'If I don't buy this now, someone else will' provides a huge boost in conversion rate.
   
   If you are heavily promoting certain products, then it might be a good idea to create individual landing pages for those products, ensuring that your customer is instantly exposed to the deal that they want to see. Often, the creation of a separate, high-performing micro-site can alleviate some of the traffic to your main site, though it often sacrifices some of your ability to create longer-lasting relationships with the customer.
   
3. Is Your Checkout Process Quick And User-Friendly? – Immediacy is the keyword on both Black Friday and Cyber Monday. People see the deals your business is offering and want them now, before they run or sell out. You need to make your customers see your other customers as competitors; it is a race to get the best prices for the best products.
   
   By letting your customers know how many of a certain product you have in stock, particularly if you are running low, you are encouraging that immediacy.
   
   Your customers don't want to get bogged down in the checkout process; they want quick, easy transactions which mean they can move onto the next deal or the next website. Trapping your customers with account creation demands, on Cyber Monday, of all days, results in a high bounce rate and negative user experience.
   
   Businesses should ensure their eCommerce solutions offers a guest checkout, so that your customers can be done as soon as possible; remember, you can always ask them to create an account after the transaction.
   
4. Is Your Website Responsively Designed? – A responsively designed site ensures that your website is accessible on any device, whether desktop (including laptop's, Mac's etc.) or mobile (including tablet PC's phones, iPods).
   
   Many people can't make it to the shops on Black Friday or Cyber Monday. As a result they use their own devices to access the same deals online. If your site isn't optimised for a variety of devices, you are deliberately turning customers away from your business.
   
   
5. Have You Given Any Thought To Long Term-Marketing? – Though the extra traffic and high conversion rates of the year's busiest retail week are fantastic, having a strategy in place to turn these newcomers into regular customers is something you need to do.
   
   Without impeding their checkout process, your eCommerce solution must ensure that you offer them the chance to sign up for an account, or newsletter; offering a discount code for those who sign up is a brilliant idea, particularly if it works in conjunction with your other offers.

Are Your Ecommerce Solutions Ready For The Week Of Cyber Monday?

Cyber Monday remains, after Boxing Day, the biggest online retailing day in the world and only by utilising the services of a specialised design team, such as those here at Advansys, can you ensure that your business is in the perfect position to make the most of the increased traffic.

For more information on how our incredible eCommerce solutions can help your business to make the most of the country's busiest shopping week, contact us today on 0845 838 2700 or email us at sales@advansys.com.