In this article, we explore 3 holiday marketing strategies to increase conversion, order value and more during the year’s most crucial sales period.
While ecommerce retailers everywhere prepare their websites for the busy shopping season ahead, there are a number of innovative holiday marketing strategies that can help drive more site traffic and increase order value and conversions (especially during a tough year for the industry where every sale counts).
As you restructure your game plan for these next critical sales months, consider these personalization strategies to make the most of your efforts:
1. Personalized content site-wide
2. Pre-exit holiday marketing content
3. Clearly visible product discounts
1. Leverage user-generated content for stronger social validation
When a consumer has found a product that interests them, there is an expectation for multiple hi-resolution product images. This expectation becomes an absolute necessity during the holiday marketing season when competition is high and shoppers are frantically bouncing from site to site looking for the perfect product.
When adding images to your site for your products, here are a few quick tips to consider:
- The images should be shot from multiple angles and include close-ups, so that every aspect of the product is visible.
- Include more than three to five images on a product page to increase cart volume.
- Adding multiple product images also helps reduce the potential for product returns, as the shopper is able to clearly analyze what they’re buying (which minimizes any unwanted surprises).
- If you really want to master this tactic, incorporate a product video to help the shopper see the product visualize the product further.
Pro tip: User-generated photography is just one of many ways you can transform the way your products are shown to shoppers. Check out 6 of our top product recommendation examples that can be implemented across key pages of your ecommerce website.
2. Encourage shoppers to stay on your site with pre-exit holiday marketing content
When it comes to finding the perfect deal at any time of year, many shoppers can be indecisive. During the holidays when brands are competing to offer the best offers and products, the chances of a shopper landing on your site and leaving empty handed are higher than ever.
Some call it bribery, we call it incentive – but reeling your shoppers back onto your site with a compelling offer can mean the difference between converting them into customers and losing them to your competitors.
Enter: the pre-exit pop-up.
A once frowned-upon tactic to increase conversion has become one of the top way to keep consumers engaged with your brand. Through the use of behavioral targeting, you can keep indecisive shoppers onsite with a personalized exit pop-up based on each individual shopper’s interests and browsing history.
For example, a new visitor can be offered a pop-up containing a special discount for first-time shoppers, which helps build a positive experience from the start. You can also take this chance to collect their email address to send that discount and boost your email database in the process.
A returning visitor might see products they’ve previously browsed to encourage a purchase.
A visitor who is about to leave your site can be enticed with the products they’ve either left in their cart (if any) or with products they’ve already viewed.
3. Clearly display your product discounts to increase order value and conversion rate
It goes without saying that every part of your website should display discounted items and that these discounts should be pushed to the forefront – but some retailers struggle with finding an ideal way to display them without impacting other product sales.
One way to beef up your holiday sales – especially in your Black Friday strategy when shoppers tend to search for the best deals – is to make discounts as clearly visible as possible. Amend your styling to include the products original price, crossed-out, or even show the exact percentage that would be saved. A change as subtle as this can hugely impact order value and drive the discount home.
Kick off your holiday marketing strategy by preparing for the Black Friday rush
With the Black Friday shopping season just around the corner, now is the time to start kicking your holiday marketing strategy into high gear. We’ve kicked off a special mid-year roundup of ecommerce marketing strategies to unveil exclusive tips and tricks for onsite optimization. With these tips, retailers can drive higher traffic, conversion, order value and more to maximize performance in a highly competitive sales period.
This article originally appeared in the Nosto blog and has been published here with permission.
