Every sales peak is a big challenge for your shop. During this time there are many more enquiries, orders and... problems. Fortunately, many situations that involve increased demand for the products you sell can be prepared for in advance. In this article, we have gathered ten key questions that every online shop owner should ask themselves, both before and after the sales peak.
The busiest time of the year for almost the entire e-commerce sector is approaching fast. After all, the last two months of the year are always a time for big purchases for yourself and the loved ones.
What events in this year's e-commerce calendar must you not forget?
This means that in the last two months of 2021 you will have as many as five opportunities to increase your sales! What can you do to make the most of this time? Start by asking yourself ten important questions. After all, the answers to these will determine what Q4 will look like in your shop.
Question 1: What does my historical data say?
Start with a thorough analysis of last year's sales peaks. What did you offer your customers then? What were the special offers? How many orders did your shop receive? How many new customers were acquired? What problems arose then? Getting the answers to these questions will give you an initial overview ahead of Q4 2021. This is because you can safely assume that this year will be similar. Polish e-commerce is growing dynamically every year and more and more customers are buying online (according to the latest Gemius report, almost 80% of Poles buy online!). They are often young and financially well-off.
You can assume that your shop traffic this year may even be higher than last year. This is why good preparation is so important, and analysis of previous results will tell you which areas to focus on first.
Question 2: Do I know my customers' expectations?
Here again, we return to sources of market and customer knowledge, such as the already quoted Gemius study. It is worthwhile to analyse e-commerce market reports on an ongoing basis. Firstly, because this sector is changing very dynamically and it may simply turn out that you have missed a trend or an important change, so you may unknowingly lose some traffic and customer interest. And secondly, with this knowledge, you can plan for further development.
Reports such as E-commerce in Poland 2021 contain a lot of practical knowledge. You will learn from them, for example:
See, for example, what Polish consumers say about shipments and returns:
If either of these forms of delivery is missing from your offer, you may find that some customers will stop buying from you. Similarly, there is the returns issue - note that the expectation of the Polish market is clear - returns should be free. Is this how it is in your shop?
If you speak English, you will find even more valuable information about e-commerce across Europe here. This information will be particularly useful for those online business owners who are planning to expand internationally.
Question 3: Do I have enough stock?
Once you have done your homework, i.e. analysed last year's shopping festivities and have a better understanding of the market you are operating in, you can move on to preparing for the 2021 sales peak. Start with the stock. Here the important questions are:
Here again, analysing historical data will be very helpful. If you had 1,000 orders during Black Friday 2020, you can expect the same or even more this year.
Question 4: Will my logistics team be able to handle?
With this comes the wider question of logistics. Stock is one thing, but it still needs to be packed and shipped. Do you have the right resources for this task? Here it is important to mention not only the warehouse staff themselves, but also the packing materials and accessories. A sudden shortage of something as mundane as packaging can bring shipping to a standstill, even if only temporarily. What this entails need not even be mentioned.
Also make sure you have the right system to manage your shipments and warehouse operations. But that's what we do! With Way2Send you have easy access to your stock and orders. This makes it easier for you to manage and fulfil your orders. For large online shops that send out hundreds of orders per month, this type of software is simply essential.
If you have not used such a solution before, we warmly invite you to test the Way2Send system. Way2Send is the way to automate your warehouse. And with integrations with hundreds of courier companies from all over the world, e-commerce platforms (such as PrestaShop and IdoSell) and systems like ERP or WMS, you have easy access to everything related to logistics and orders. In one place! Do you want to know more? Contact us!
Question 5: Is the shop ready for increased traffic?
Here, technical issues come into play first and foremost. During Black Friday, or shortly before Christmas, the number of orders can increase by up to several hundred per cent. This means several hundred per cent more traffic to your website.
If you are using an external e-commerce platform, make sure that your plan does not have any limits imposed (primarily in terms of the number of people viewing the site at the same time or the number of orders placed). Generally, if there are such limits, they tend to be set at a safe level, but it is worth verifying this.
If, on the other hand, you are using your own server, hosting and platform (e.g. WooCommerce), find out from your provider of these services what kind of traffic your shop will be able to handle. There's nothing worse than not being able to view your site while everyone is looking for gift ideas. Even a few minutes of website inactivity can result in financial losses of several thousand zlotys.
PAGE LOAD SPEED
It is worth recalling on this occasion that, for some time now, Google has been implementing new guidelines (so-called core web vitals), which indicate how highly positioned sites in the search engine should perform. One of the key indicators of CWV is LCP, or largest contentful paint. This indicator tells you how long the largest text/graphic block on your site takes to load. In simple terms, we can assume that it is the loading time of your website. According to Google's guidelines, this time should not exceed 4 seconds, and perfectly if it goes below 2.5 seconds:
Start by measuring your site's current score. You can do this using a free tool provided by Google. Data from the K2 Precise agency shows that as recently as September 2021, only 56% of Polish online shops were performing well (under 2.5 seconds). 8% of shops load in a time described as poor:
There is therefore plenty to work on. The same agency indicates that the fastest-loading shops achieve a result of... less than a second.
Question 6: Do I have a good idea for special offers during the peak?
In the age of price comparison sites and marketplaces, checking that your Christmas/Black Friday special offers are actually value for money is not a major problem. If you want to get the most out of Q4 plan your special offers well. Consider:
WHICH PRODUCTS SHOULD HAVE LOWERED PRICES AND BY HOW MUCH?
Here you need to check what your customers are happy to buy and which products you have the biggest margin on. Remember, too, that any special offer affects products that are not discounted (their popularity falls during this time). For example, if you promote products on which your margins are slim, those that give you better earnings will suffer.
HOW TO CREATE GIFT SETS?
Product sets are very popular when looking for a gift idea. It is also a good opportunity to sell off products that are a little less popular and avoid the problem of dead stock, i.e. products that are no longer of interest to customers and have become unsellable. You can combine complementary products in sets (use cross-selling for this), but it is also a good idea to combine a bestseller with a less popular product.
Here it all depends on your ingenuity! Here it all depends on your inventiveness!
WHICH PROMOTIONAL STRATEGY WILL YOU USE?
The choice is wide! You can, for example, go in the following directions:
Question 7: Is my marketing strategy ready?
Promotions are one thing, but you still need to ensure that as many people as possible find out about them. Nowadays, an omnichannel approach prevails in e-commerce, which assumes that online shops are wherever their customers are and try to constantly build long-term relationships with them.
Ensure that your offer is well visible above all in channels such as:
Ensure you have a strategy in place to guarantee good visibility among current and potential customers.
Question 8: How to encourage new customers to visit more often?
Sales peaks are always a time when many new customers come into your shop. It would be a shame to waste this potential, right? Create a strategy to keep them coming back for longer. A focal point can be a loyalty programme. The ARC Market and Opinion study cited earlier indicates that last year as many as 60% of respondents used such programmes! The report also says that these consumers are generally heavily involved in participating in such programmes (the active group is as high as 63% of all users). Other opportunities include the aforementioned mobile apps and vouchers for future purchases. It is also worth actively seeking marketing consents, e.g. for sending newsletters. In this situation, every new customer is also a new email address to which you can send information about new products on offer and promotions.
Retargeting also comes into play, which is a strategy that allows you to display ads to people who have already been to your website. Retargeting is used to remind people of previously viewed products or an unfinished purchase process. The push notifications mentioned earlier work on a very similar principle. According to research, the effectiveness of retargeting (also often referred to as remarketing) is really high. The CTR of such ads is even ten times higher than that of standard display ads!
Question 9: What lessons should I learn for the future?
We are still before the 2021 peak. Make a good analysis of everything that will happen in your shop during this time and use this knowledge next year. There will probably be some mistakes and slip-ups. Consider them as valuable lessons for the future. That way, every year your offer will get better and better and your customers will be happier and happier!
Question 10: Can I somehow automate work in the future?
In today's world, automation is a trend that is emerging everywhere, including in marketing and logistics. Marketing automation tools will help you to do things faster and better:
And what about the logistics? Way2Send also fits in perfectly with the trend towards work automation. Our system provides you with everything you need to manage your orders and warehouse work efficiently. With our help, the dispatch of orders is much faster and smooth! Do you want to know more? Fill in the form on the website and see how we can help you in your daily work.
