StayOnSearch » Ecommerce

Increase Conversions with this Pre-Launch Product Checklist

Mark Thompson — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 12:15:46 +0000

When you create a new product that you plan on launching on your website or blog, it takes more than just a good product idea for it to be successful. It needs to be marketed properly to your target audience. A few things I learned from when I released the Link Builder’s Toolkit, was the pre-launch marketing execution can be as time consuming as the actual product creation. However if the pre-launch is done correctly it can significantly increase your sales.

Pre-launch Product Checklist

1. Lead Generation Setup

Hopefully you already have a nice in-house marketing list that you can leverage to reach out to your readers about your new product. If not, you should start right away. The more e-mail addresses you can collect, the better chance you have for more exposure and sales.

Freebies - Start by offering a piece of content for free, in exchange for their e-mail address. Giving away the 1st chapter of your eBook, a video interview you did, a podcast or a whitepaper are great incentives for gathering e-mail addresses.
Giveaway Sign-Up - Give an incentive that if they sign-up they will be entered into a drawing to win your product for free.
Optimized Contact Form - Make sure the lead gen form is simple and easy to fill out, with minimal information needed from the user.

2. Reaching Out to Industry Influencers

Give Your Product to 5-10 Industry Influencers - By doing this you can leverage their readership and traffic to try and create some buzz about your product. Try asking them to write a review about the product or maybe ask them to conduct an interview on you, that they can then use on their blog.
Ask to Guest Blog - Reach to reputable blogs to see if you could write a guest post that covers topics related to your product. Then add a soft sell in your author bio about the new product launch.
Gain Feedback - While you are still putting the finishing touches to your product, it is important to get some feedback from other in the industry. Doing a focus group or reaching out to the people who you gave your product to gain some feedback on how it be improved.

3. Affiliate Area

Create a Page - If you choose to offer an Affiliate Program where people can earn commission for marketing/selling your products, you should have a section on your site that speaks directly to them.
Create Marketing Materials - Provide your affiliate with all the necessary materials they will need to market your product. Include banner ads (various sizes), training materials, sales letters, incentives, coupon codes, etc…
Create Incentives - Starting a contest or offering incentives for your affiliates will give them a reason to heavily promote your product and entice them to want to make your product more, over others.

4. Landing Page Creation

Create a Landing Page or Micro-site – Depending on the quality and value of the product you will want to have a central place where you drive readers to. If you are selling something at a low price like an Ebook, it would probably make sense to have a landing page on your current domain. However if your product is more complex like a Training Course or login area with premium content, you may want to create a new domain that matches the name of your product.
Add Promo Graphics - Make sure that you have multiple spots on your site where you can help promote the product. Usually in the sidebar, at the bottom of a blog post and at the end of an RSS feed are great places to add a promo graphic about your new product.
Include Conversion Best Practices – Make sure that your landing page is using all the best practices to increase your conversion rates including capturing headlines, feature/benefit statements, special pricing, optimized checkout process, money-back guarantee, testimonials, etc…

5. E-Mail Newsletter Creation

Auto-responders – Have a series of auto-responders for anyone who signs up to be informed when the product launches. Include various content that talk about what’s included in the product, how its going to help you, and timely offers if they act right away.
Branded Template – This is not mandatory but it would be nice to have a newsletter template that has the same look and feel of your website. This will help improve branding and associate your logo/colors with the product.

6. Create Social Buzz

Post Updates to Your Social Profiles – Post updates on Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin about anything newsworthy that relates to the product launch.
Monitor Keyword Mentionings – Reach out to people who are discussing similar products and topics. Create a strategy that engages with these people and makes them aware of your upcoming product launch. Offer these people a discount or reason to fill out a form so that you can follow up with them when the product launches.

Optimizing Product Descriptions on E-Commerce Sites

Susan Petracco — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 12:30:16 +0000

To run a successful e-commerce site, you need to focus on two kinds of audiences – humans and search engines. One of the most effective ways to influence both audiences is with your product descriptions. Fortunately, it is possible to write great product descriptions that appeal to real customers and to search engines at the same time.

The worst thing you can do (other than to have no description at all) is to use one provided by the manufacturer to all of their retailers. Canned copy on multiple sites doesn’t impress the ranking algorithms, and often you can improve upon cookie-cutter descriptions for real customers, too.

Writing your own product descriptions can be time-consuming, but the benefit is substantial. You might also consider hiring a copywriter to handle the bulk of the work, and rely on his or her professional writing background.

Writing Descriptions for SEO

From an SEO perspective, try to write descriptions that are at least 250 words in length; this gives search engines something to chew on. E-commerce sites are full of navigation links, images, multiple calls-to-action, and other elements that aren’t textual content. It’s important to include enough words in your description to balance the other elements on the page.
Identify your keywords through careful research, and try to include their variations within the product description. It’s ok to repeat the name of the product within the description body, too. But be careful not to keyword-stuff. As with any site, keyword-stuffing looks unnatural to search engines, and it’s not people-friendly either.
Utilize your product descriptions to boost your internal linking strategy. Try to include links to related products or categories within the actual description. The contextual benefits of having links within paragraphs of text outweigh simply linking to related products or categories in a list that’s separate from the descriptions. When you link to other pages, use keywords that are beneficial to the page you’re linking to.

Making Descriptions Useful for Customers

Take a tip from bloggers – avoid using one long paragraph after another when writing your descriptions. Vary the content and make it easily scannable by using sub-headers and bulleted or numbered lists. This helps your description from feeling too dense and overwhelming for your visitors.
Include the item’s basics: color, dimensions, and material are useful for many products. Other products have their own detailed features that are helpful to shoppers. For example, a computer’s description should list the number and types of connections it has. A used car’s description might include its mileage, maintenance history, engine type, and condition.
Don’t only describe the features of your products. Also outline the benefits that the product will provide to the customer. How will it make her feel? What can she do with the product? Does it provide a sense of security, or a sense of status?
Mention any prerequisites needed to use the product. If it extends another product, make that clear, and also link to the “base” product if you sell it. List any batteries it might need. If the owner of the item needs to be of a certain age or to have a particular skill level, mention that too.
A final source to tap is your customer service department. If they receive frequent questions about a certain product, find out what those are and include the answers within the product description.

By the time you’ve addressed the issues in both of these lists, you should have a product description that will be beneficial to your customers and to the search engines – which means a boost to your bottom line. So if you’re currently using canned or too-short descriptions, consider taking time to write custom descriptions to improve your business.

5 Important Elements of a Sales Landing Page

Mark Thompson — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 12:00:44 +0000

Every great sales or lead generation landing page have certain similar characteristics to them. Those characteristics lead to increases in sales, leads and overall conversion rates.

Let’s take a look at the different elements of a successful landing page.

1. Enticing Offer

No matter how nice of a landing page you create, if your offer sucks, nobody will want to download/buy your product. Make sure the offer says how it is a solution for the pain or problem your target audience has. In the example below, this affiliate blogging e-book is geared towards bloggers and affiliate marketers who want to learn how to make money by blogging about affiliate products. The particular goal of this page is to gather e-mail addresses, to then sell other products in the future.

2. Bulleted List of Features/Benefits

When a visitor comes to your landing page, you have only a few seconds to capture their attention. Usually once the reader sees your main headline, they will decide to keep reading or to leave. If they decide to keep reading, you need to keep them interested by offering some features and benefits of what they product with offer them. By using bullet points or a numbered list, it makes it easier to read and will draw the eye of the reader.

3. Tangible Product Graphic

Specific to selling virtual products, you need to try to paint a picture to the buyer as to what is it they are buying. Sometimes that can be hard since it’s not something they can touch. That is why creating a graphic that represents a tangible product can help make it more real. In the image below, this is a great example of an e-book that gives the buyer a sense of tangibility to the product.

4. Appealing “Download/Buy Now” button

Sometimes just running an A/B test on your button can increase your conversion rate by 50%. Make sure it is prominent and is draws the readers eye to the area.

5. Quick Lead Gen Form

Don’t make the reader have to fill out a long form, just to download/purchase a product. Make it as quick and painless as possible, adding only the MOST important fields. If all you are trying to do is gather the users e-mail address, just have one field for them to enter. If they are purchasing a product, try to integrate Paypal or Google Checkout to expedite the checkout process.

Use a call to action directly above or next to the area where they are going to enter their information. This will give them another reason to give you their information.

6. Bonus: Video Introduction**

Personally I don’t think you necessarily need to have a video introduction about your product, but it definitely can help. Giving your reader another way to connect with the website or person selling the product, makes them feel more comfortable moving forward with giving their information or purchasing the product.

Why More Traffic Doesn’t Always Mean More Sales

Alan Mater — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 11:00:41 +0000

If you have visited as many blogs as I have over the last few years, or if you are relatively new to Internet Marketing, you will probably have read many articles that totally distort the truth. One of the best I’ve seen goes something like this: “If your website suffers from no traffic and needs more leads and sales, the best solution to this problem is to increase the traffic.”

All That Glitters is Not Gold

In the context of this post, they would have you believe that getting more traffic to your website means making more sales. The problem with this ideology is that it just isn’t true. Far from it! What if your visitors are just window shoppers? What if they don’t care what your website is offering, no matter how enticing you think your products are? Well it all boils down to just one thing: you are getting traffic but not targeted traffic. It’s as simple as that.

Why Getting High Traffic is Not Enough

While it may sound nice to know you have a good amount of traffic arriving at your website, the truth is that traffic that does not convert to sales is quite useless. Like someone who has good money to spend on PPC could easily bring in an absurd amount of traffic. But, if there is no conversion, this traffic becomes worthless. For sales to actually take place, you must have good conversions.

How Do You Increase Sales Conversions?

As there is no face-to-face dealing, the challenge is to provide an unforgettable customer experience that is special, satisfying and the right information he/she is looking for.

If your product provides a solution to a problem, include this benefit in your content.
You should offer whatever help to make your visitors understand your product better and how to use it. If this means providing a video to help explain things a little better, get it done immediately.
Put up a personal message on your website, even if it is just a simple message to welcome your visitors.
Put up some of your customers’ testimonials on your website to show confidence of the product from people who have used it.
Provide your “call to action” like a link to purchase and download your product. All the earlier steps culminate in this last step, so make sure that this call to action is prominently displayed on your website.

Using Social Media to Build Your Ecommerce Business

Mark Baartse — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 11:45:52 +0000

Social media, networking, tweeting, status updates, joining groups… all these terms are becoming part of everyday life for many and with social media offering such a wide spectrum of advertising space; employing SEO into your latest Tweets is a trick worth noting!

The Internet should be thought of as a huge open space full of opportunities to advertise and market your product or business – every opportunity should be taken full advantage of. The social networking scene came, saw and conquered the world within an extremely short time frame. Its popularity makes it an ideal canvass to build your business from. Why not take advantage of Internet marketing while you network and mix work and play?

Here are some of the top ways to boost business with social networking:

Create a Company Group or Profile

This is the first thing everyone should do when they join a networking site and it is one of the easiest ways to get your business noticed. Use photos of your products and invite friends to join your group as well as asking them to spread the word to their friends and so on. Also, check out businesses that offer similar products and if their friend list is visible; use it!

Check out the new StayOnSearch LinkedIn Group!

Make it Easy for People to Promote You via Social Media

There’s people out there who like your products, so let them promote them to their friends via Facebook, Twitter, and so on. There’s a good chance their friends will like it as well! Some shopping carts such as Volusion even have these features integrated out of the box, but it’s usually pretty easy to add them.

Check out “Where To Get Social Media Buttons For Your Blog” to easily add ways for people to promote your products.

Update Your Status to Promote Your Business

Once you have created a group, status updating or ‘Tweeting’ about a new product, a sale or promotion, special discounts, offers or generally any new and exciting information about your business is a simple yet effective way to raise awareness. Building your ecommerce business successfully is all about marketing and increasing site traffic and with the world at your fingertips on social networking sites; it is an effortless way to promote for free!

Provide Some Links, Links and More Links to Your Website

If they can see your business, admire your products but have no easy way to get to your website then people simply won’t bother. The Internet has made us lazy and if things are hard work to find then the majority of people won’t bother trying to find them! With this in mind, you want to scatter links to your website on your profile or group page that are visible and easy to find and follow. Of course, links can have SEO value as well. Some links in social media are ignored by Google, but regardless of that, they are still good to have just for users, and if Google picks up a few them, so much the better.

Growing an e-commerce business is hard work and using all the advertising mediums possible is key to success. Use social media to your advantage – engage your audience, keep them interested (and entertained if you can!), and grow your business.

Step-By-Step Guide For Launching a Virtual Product

Mark Thompson — Tue, 11 May 2010 12:00:56 +0000

It can be an exhausting process when launching and marketing a virtual product. This post is suppose to act as a step-by-step guide that will show you the process of creating a product, all the way to your launch.

1. Product Research

So hopefully you have an idea or at least a topic that you will be covering for your product. The questions you should be asking yourself are what is a pain or problem people have in your industry? and how can you alleviate or fix that problem with your product?

Once you have a concrete idea for what your product will cover, you will want to do some searches to see whats already out there. This will help you to figure out a competitive advantage for your product.

Competitor Research – Look at your top competitors to see what they offer. If possible, purchase a few of their products to help you generate ideas, identify opportunities that your competitors may have missed, and to help create your selling points.
Pricing – See what similar products are being currently sold for. Find out what promotions, specials, and sales your competitors have used to help sell their products. Are they using a one-time purchase model or is there a way to turn it into a reoccurring revenue model?

2. Product Creation

Once you have figured out the exact product you are going to be creating and have done your homework on your competitors, it is now time to create your product.

Format – How do you want to deliver your content to your audience? Is it through an e-book, podcast, video, bundle of products, etc…? Finding out the right way to deliver the content can be harder to figure out, than just seeing what your competitors have done. If you are able to find a unique way to deliver your content, you can increase the perceived value of your product, resulting in selling it for more.
Completeness – If you are going to be selling a product, it better have additional value that you can’t find on the web for free. For example, there are a lot of keyword research tools out there, that are free to use. So in order to sell a premium keyword research tool, there needs to be additional data or features that a free tool does not offer. It may offer a variety of data from multiple sources, a way to organize your keyword research or creates a client-ready report. If you are selling an e-book on ways to make money from your blog, giving in-depth details and concrete examples of blogs that have made money will help make your product worthy to buy, as it is more detailed than a blog post or article.

3. Landing Page Design

The way you layout out your page, the headlines you use, graphics, colors, buttons, and conversion funnel all play a part into how many people will purchase your products. Depending on the type of product you are looking to sell, it should reflect your business, industry and target audience.

Site Structure/Navigation – Figuring out the best place to put your new product can be a bit of a challenge if you have never made an area for products before. Finding the ideal real estate on the homepage to feature the product, as well as finding a spot in the current navigation that will allow people to get to your product from anywhere on the site.
Product Graphics – Having a high-quality photos or screen-shots of the product will help to give a graphical representation of what the product does or problem it solves. For example, if you are offering software, showing screenshots, along with tutorial videos could help the user better understand how the software functions and its capabilities.
Product Description – Giving detailed information about the description including product overview, features, benefits, problems it solves, and functionality can help give compelling reasons to purchase the product.
Call to Action – Using capturing headlines that draw the readers eye will help keep the user engaged with your landing page.
A/B Testing – To take your landing page to another level, you may want to run an A/B test to see which landing page variation gets a better conversion rate.

4. Shopping Cart Integration

In order to allow people to purchase your product, you must integrate some sort of shopping cart or payment gateway. This will allow the user to purchase your product via credit card, paypal, google checkout, etc…

Payment Options – The more purchase options you give the user, the better the chance you will have of converting that user. If you plan on only having a few products on your website, a simple Paypal button should be just fine. If you are going to be offering a wider variety of products, it would be worth it to use a shopping cart.

Checkout Steps – Minimizing the number of steps it takes to purchase your product will increase conversion rates and usability.
Promo/Discount Codes – Allowing promo codes and running specials will push users to buy now and put in the users mind that they are getting a deal.
Testimonials/Case Studies – Getting testimonials from real users of your product can show real results and how your product helped their needs. It can also give your product more credibility if your testimonials are from industry influencers.

5. Marketing Outreach

Your product is only as good as how you market it. If you already have influence in an industry, it will be easier to spread the word about your new product. However if you don’t necessarily have the influence and the traffic it will take some targeted marketing to exposure your product.

Blogger/Writer Outreach – The most effective approach I have seen so far is by getting your product in the hands of bloggers and writers who write for the top blogs/websites in your industry. If you write each of them a personalized email with a free trial or copy of your product (and it is of high quality), they will usually write about it and post it on their blog. This can help your product get exposed to hundreds or even thousands of new users. It can also help gain a quality backlink to your landing page, which will help with organic search. Hopefully you already know which blogs and websites are key places that you can market your websites on, so reaching out should be relatively easy.
E-mail Marketing – If you have an in-house marketing list, you should create a e-mail marketing campaign that notifies them about the new product. If you list is of high quality, this can be a great way to generate sales.
Pay-Per-Click – Depending on the industry and the amount of competition, a PPC advertising campaign can help gain some visibility in the search engines. Adding ad copy that talks about the key features and price can help qualify the user before they click.
Social Media – Using your existing social media accounts to spread the word can be a great way to have your friends help your product go viral on Twitter and Facebook. You may also want to monitor chatter for keywords that are related to your product and reach out to those people.
Affiliate Programs – Creating an affiliate program using affiliate management websites like ClickBank and CJ can allow others to market for you. In return you just give them a percentage of any sales they generate.
Partnerships – You may be able to bundle your product into a pre-existing websites product. Partnering with another company or person that offers complimentary products, can make the overall package more attractive and generate more sales.
3rd Party Sites – Depending on your product, there are sites like Google Base, Amazon.com, and eBay that allow you to submit your products (even virtual products) to their sites. They do however take a portion of each sale, however they generate a lot of traffic.

6. Tracking/Analytics

There is no reason not to be tracking everything on your website. You should create a unique goal for when someone completes a purchase on your website. If your product has a set amount, you should enter that goal value. You should also be aware of where your sales are coming from. If you notice that the people coming from a blog that you are working with to promote your product, you should find other ways you can market on that site. If it also important to measure the impact of your social media efforts from places like Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin, and any other social sites you engage in.

7. Further Enhancements/Feedback

Regardless of what type of product you are selling, there is always going to be things you can do to improve it. Listing to your customers feedback, suggestions, and issues will help you to improve your product for an upcoming version or model.

8. Support

For virtual products, there could be issues with customers receiving the product. That is why you should always have support information on your website and landing page so people can contact you with any concerns. Having a plan and strategy so you are ready to resolve any issues people may have with your product.

Ho Ho Holiday Headlines from the Top Retailers

Mark Thompson — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 08:00:52 +0000

With Christmas right around the corner, retailers are trying to tailor every marketing message on their site to compel holiday shoppers to buy some last minute gifts.

Here are a number of call to action graphics and headlines the top retailers are using to stimulate shoppers to spend! I want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Best Buy

Guaranteed Christmas Delivery: Ensure Gifts Arrive By December 24th
No Shipping. No Waiting. Buy Online. Pick Up In-Store
Give the Gift of Endless Entertainment
Shipping Countdown Sale. 3 Days Only. Online Only.

REI

Order by 8 p.m. PT 12/21 and we’ll deliver by 12/24 when you choose Standard Shipping.
Save Up to 50% During REI’s Holiday Clearance – On Now
Holiday Happiness Guaranteed

TigerDirect

After-Christmas Sale Starts Now! Save on GPS, Laptops, TVs & More
50 Gifts Under $50…Save Time…Shop Online
2009 Holiday Shipping Schedule
Ultimate New Year Giveaway, Over $11,000 in Prizes!

Overstock.com

Save Up To 52% Off With Our Red Line Deals
Holiday Gift Finder: Make Someone’s Season Bright With These Fun Gifts
Enter For a Chance To Win a Toyota Prius Every Week in December
Free Shipping On Your Entire Order
Look For This Image for Guaranteed Delivery by December 24th
Free Overnight Shipping – Ends Tomorrow

K-Mart

Better Than Black Friday Sale
Christmas Countdown: Enter For Your Chance To Win Up To $50,000
Unwrap The Excitement With the 2009 Holiday Toy Catalog
Free Shipping on Toy Orders $49 or More
Free Shipping over $20.08 and $20.09 off a $125 Purchase

Macy’s

Extra 20% Off and Free Shipping
Amazing 2-Day Gift Specials Now Through Saturday
Find the Right Gift, Right Now: Holiday Gift Guide
Free Guaranteed Christmas Delivery: Choose Standard Shipping by 12/21

OfficeMax

3 Days Left to Save – $20 In-Store Coupon
You Are One Step Away From Special Savings

Toys R Us

Wrap Up the Savings Deal of the Day
After Christmas Blowout. Shop 8AM – 10PM
Bonus Shopping Hours – Select Stores Open ’til 1AM
Extended! Free Shipping on Thousands of Items
Two Day Sale Plus Bonus Deals

Sears

4 Days Left for Expedited Shipping
Need it Now? Buy Online. Pick Up in Store
Christmas Wish Book 2009
Black Friday Now. Every Saturday
New Years Savings on Fitness, Electronics, Apparel & MORE
After Christmas Sale Prices Starting At Noon

Target

Electronics Under $100. Awesome Gifts, Impressive Prices
Free Shipping When You Spend $50 on Select Items Ends Dec 21st
The Season’s Hottest Toys Priced to Wow

Cyber Monday 2009 – Boom or Bust?

Mark Thompson — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 13:00:14 +0000

Today is Cyber Monday, the biggest online shopping day of the year. This is the day where online retailers slash prices in order to start the holiday shopping season off with a bang. According to Shop.org and Forrester Research, online retailers are optimistic about Cyber Monday.

By The Numbers

It is estimated that 84% of major online retailers will offer some kind of promotion for cyber monday. You will also see the majority of deals on particular items (42.9%), for specific days (32.9%), along with free shipping on all purchases (15.7%). Almost 69 million workers will be shopping at the office for online specials.

60% off online retailers believe the US economy will improve within the next year. Also of those retailers, 57% of the retailers surveyed showed they were more profitable in 2008 than 2007.

Survey conducted by BIGresearch

“Cyber Monday” Searches on a Steady Increase

Cyber Monday Deals

CyberMonday.com: The first place any online shopper should go for deals, specials and promotions for the leading retailers. This year over 700 retailers will be posting their Cyber Monday deals on this site.
PC World – 20 Hot Cyber Monday Deals: This is your resource for finding all of those awesome tech gift this holiday season for retailers like Best Buy, Dell, Wal-Mart, and Staples
DealTaker: Another great place to search 100s of retailers for great CyberMonday specials.
Offers.com: More deals from the top online retailers.
RetailMeNot: The popular coupon site, has an entire section for just Cyber Monday deals, promotion, and specials.

Tips for Shopping on Cyber Monday [Video on CBS, The Early Show]

So what is in store for today? We will have to wait and see!

For more information on the upcoming holiday shopping season check out Holiday Marketing Guide 2009: Hot Products, Tips, and Resources for Online Retailers.

Holiday Marketing Guide 2009: Hot Products, Tips, & Resources for Online Retailers

Mark Thompson — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 14:30:28 +0000

Forrester estimates that online retail sales will reach $44.7 billion this holiday season. That is a 8% increase year over year. The contributing factor is the increase in buyers doing more of their shopping online, as well as retailers focusing a larger portion of their marketing dollars on internet sales. Here are some important stats to take from their report.

39% of consumers plan to wait and see if the product they want to buy will go on sale
24% of consumers plan on purchasing lower-cost alternatives to brand they normally purchase
Retailers plan on keeping smaller inventories, increase customer support, and enhance the website with greater usability and social media tools.

Coupon Usage During the Holidays

The number of searchers for coupon related searches is up from 2008. That means that consumers are being more careful with every dollar they spend.

Sites like RetailMeNot, FatWallet, and SlickDeals aggregate coupons, promo codes, and special offers from hundreds of retailers to help consumers save money. DealTaker.com is leveraging Twitter to promote their site and give online shoppers an easy way to find coupons to stores they are looking for. Simply tweet @couponbot “store name” and DealTaker will reply to your tweet with the most current coupons/promos for that store.

Finding the Hot Products for the 2009 Holiday Season

There are a number of online retailers who are giving some insights as to which products they feel will be the hot products for the holidays.

Huge Toy Retailer Toys R Us created the 2009 Hot Holiday Toy List that have been hand picked to highlight the most popular toys throughout the year.

Amazon.com has a toy list of over 400 toys, games, sports gears, movies and gadgets to help you find great gifts for this upcoming holiday season.

Cyber Monday: November 29th, 2009

For those who are not familiar with the term “Cyber Monday“, it is the internet’s equivalent to Black Friday. It marks the beginning of online shopping for the upcoming holiday season. Online retailers offer amazing deals to entice online shoppers to purchase gifts for the holidays.

Historically, there has been an increase in sales on Cyber Monday, however from 2007 to 2008 there was a slight decrease. To make up for the down economy and people spending less, retailers are trying to promote holiday specials earlier than normal to try and make up for lost revenue.

Resources for the Upcoming Holiday Season

YouTube and Target have partnered to give you Holiday Solutions. Your one stop shop for house/party ideas, gift giving tips, party recipes, and holiday related videos. This is a unique way for both YouTube and Target to engage with online shoppers, by offering a free resource for the holidays. With useful content and holiday products built right into this Holiday Solutions YouTube channel, Target can take advantage of people looking to purchase products/gifts for upcoming holiday parties.

Tips on Increasing Online Sales This Holiday Season

The Google Retail Advertising Blog wrote a post about how to give incentives to your online shoppers. Even in a down economy there are still people buying, they are just more cautious.

87% of shoppers plan on taking advantage of discount pricing or holiday speccials
73% of consumers plan on taking advantage of free shipping

With that being said, over 260 retailers are participating in National Free Shipping Day to try and lure more buyers.

In another related post, Google talks about when people are likely to purchase during the holiday season.

46% of consumers plan on purchasing the majority of their gift during early or late December.

Sears is using their “Black Friday Now! Doorbusters” promotion to try and extend the busiest shopping day of the year, by offering black friday deals every Saturday through Christmas.

More Quick Tips for better Usability and Conversions

Offer multiple payment options
Offer a timely incentive (free shipping, discount, good until xx/09
Decrease number of steps to purchase
Make sure products are in stock
Create pre-packaged deals or discounts for bulk orders
Follow up email marketing campaign for complimentary products
Leverage social media to engage users and promote sales

Google Commerce Search Improves the Online Shopping Experience

Mark Thompson — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 14:10:18 +0000

Just in time for the 2009 holiday season, Google has announced its new eCommerce service called Google Commerce Search. Google has created an shopping cart for online retailers that is meant to improve site search and usability. The new cart comes equipped with a number of customizations and leverages Google’s search technology. All shopping carts will also be hosted on Google’s servers.

To get started users will have to contact a Google representative. Once they are signed up, users will upload their product database to Google Merchant Center and choose a number of customizations including design elements, promotions, categories, and pricing. Pricing will be determined by the number of products and number of searchers performed on the site. With that being said, this eCommerce solution is not cheap. The shopping cart starts at $50k/year.

What Google says about Google Commerce Search:

Enable visitors to find the right products faster
Filter results by category, price, brand or other attributes
Provide user-friendly spelling options and synonyms
Increase website conversions and sales
Boost or promote chosen products within search results
Deploy search solution in days, and scale effortlessly
Customize, track, and optimize performance