This year's Cyber Monday saw record breaking online sales. So it's not surprising that you might be thinking about how to make the most of Cyber Monday next year. If so, keep reading as we'll be looking at Cyber Monday 2012 and the infrastructure you can start to put in place now for 2013.
"Cyber Monday" is a trend we’ve borrowed from across the pond. It’s typically the day most people shop for Christmas presents online - usually it happens just after pay day, with e-retailers temporarily cutting their prices to drive sales.
This year's Cyber Monday (26 November) saw another massive boost in online shopping, with sales up 26% on last year.
Businesses need to have a mobile strategy to compete and cash-in on higher online sales demand. Need proof?
With mobile becoming more popular with shoppers, it's important to ask yourself - is your website geared up for someone looking at it on a small screen? If not, you could risk missing out on those all-important sales. There are two main ways you can make your website mobile-friendly and appeal to more shoppers:
Build it (your website) and they (shoppers) will come? Unfortunately, just having a website won't be enough to increase sales if you're not drawing people to it.
So you might want to consider running a few targeted ads on Google or social networking websites and investing in optimising your website for search engines to bring in traffic. You don’t have to be a website programmer to understand basic search engine optimisation (SEO) though. Here are a few things anyone can do:
Having a content management system you can use easily means you’ll be confident enough to make all of these changes yourself. But if you’d prefer to leave it to us, we’ll give you an online marketing consultant to look at all the ways you can improve your rankings.
There was a huge amount of Cyber Monday-related buzz on Twitter and Facebook - as people took to social media to brag about bargains, share tips and get advice on potential purchases.
Promoting your special offers through social media channels is an easy way to drive people to your site, so make sure you’re active and are engaging in a conversation with your customers. You also might want to make plans to monitor your social media channels more closely in the run up to Christmas next year, so you can respond to any customer queries or complaints super-quickly, winning praise from them rather than criticism.
You don’t need to spend a fortune on your website to properly prepare for Cyber Monday 2013, but there are some things you can’t ignore:
There’s no point in getting people to your website if your staff can’t fulfil the orders once they come in. If you’re an e-commerce business, having fast internet speeds to help staff process orders is hugely important.
You don’t want your website to crash on you on your busiest day because it can’t handle the traffic either. Protect yourself by choosing a web hosting platform you can trust which gives you enough space and support on hand, should you need it.
Your customers aren’t just shopping on the high street. They are demanding you have a well-designed web and mobile presence. If you don’t, they have plenty of other places they can shop online. Having the right digital infrastructure is critical to making the most of this golden opportunity.
Is Cyber Monday a bid deal to you? Please let us know if you’ve seen any spike in sales this year by leaving a comment below.
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Posted 153 days ago