Sales Strategies: Online Holiday Sales Tips for 2006

The four Mondays between Thanksgiving and Christmas -- aka: “Cyber Mondays 1 to 4” -- were the peak selling days during the 2005 holiday shopping season, according to Performics, a division of DoubleClick Digital Advertising Solutions. No surprise: Cyber Mondays 2 and 3 were particularly strong selling days.

This year, there will again be four Mondays between Thanksgiving and Christmas, but Cyber Monday 4 may be a stronger selling day than it was in 2005, note Performics officials. That’s because Christmas day is, itself, a Monday, and so Cyber Monday 4 (Dec. 18) will fall a full week before the holiday, leaving adequate time for shoppers to order and get rush deliveries.

Now that you’re armed with this information, here are some marketing and merchandising tips from Performics that can help you plan your 2006 holiday selling season:

¥ Push certain products at specific times of the selling season. For example, personalized, monogrammed, or other custom-made or -configured merchandise should be marketed more heavily for Cyber Mondays 1 and 2. Meanwhile, low consideration items such as gift cards, and perishables such as food should peak in sales later in the season on Cyber Mondays 3 and 4. Adjust your offers and homepages accordingly, Performics advises.

¥ Let the calendar guide your selection of promotional offers. Early in the shopping season, for example, tout order-encouraging promotions that you easily can fulfill in time for the holiday. Tip: Cyber Mondays 1 and 2 are ideal times to offer free shipping and “buy two, get one free” type of offers, Performics notes.

¥ Follow the peaks and valleys. In 2005, aggregate online sales started their gradual decline on Tuesdays, and continued declining through Saturdays. Sundays began the slow climb back up to Cyber Monday peaks. If your own daily sales volumes mirrored this national trend, use that information to plan your own back-end operations (e.g., contact center schedules, distribution center staffing, logistics). Plan on resting your hard-working staff on, say, Friday and Saturday in order for them to more effectively gear up for the Monday rush.