E-commerce is undoubtedly the sector most impacted by seasonality . Sales periods, different holidays or simply weather conditions influence consumer purchases.



Christmas is fast approaching and, like the elves who must finish preparing all the gifts from around the world, you must ensure that your e-commerce site is ready to receive the massive arrival of Internet users.

In other words, you absolutely must support your prospects’ purchasing journey. Consider creating buying guides , innovative content and communicating on social networks to boost your visibility in the run-up to Christmas.

Waiting too long puts you at a disadvantage. You need to be ready to capitalize on the increased traffic and consumer sentiment during this time. They will be ready and willing to click your buy button. So make sure you put these actions in place to get your online business ready for the holiday season.

Whether to educate your prospects on how you can help them during this boom period or to promote your offers to your consumers, here is THE essential checklist to carry out all the checks .

Better than a gift list!

1. Analyze data from the end of the previous year

To start, learn the lessons from last Christmas. Sit quietly in front of your computer with a coffee or tea, open an Excel spreadsheet and note on one side the ideas that worked well and the good practices used.

It's something simple to do but many businesses completely ignore this gold mine that they have at their disposal. Where did the majority of your traffic come from during this time last year? What led to conversions? Was it through email marketing , social media , paid search , or organic traffic ?

On the other hand, think about areas for improvement , problems encountered and decisions that can be improved.

For example, if a business estimates that email marketing was responsible for 40% of its conversions this past holiday season, it would be smart to implement larger email campaigns this year .

This will leave you with a healthy foundation for your end-of-year marketing.


2. Put your e-commerce site in Christmas colors

Colors evoke emotions and have a sometimes staggering influence on purchasing decisions . Also, everyone loves the spirit of Christmas. You must therefore equip your e-commerce site with colors reflecting this atmosphere.


You can be as creative as you want and deck out your site in red and green if that suits you. But obviously, this doesn't mean changing your theme completely.

The ideal is to choose a color palette evoking Christmas (red, green, gold, bronze, blue, etc.) and to add small touches to your design.

Update your visuals for this wonderful Christmas celebration. It would be a shame not to embellish your emails, your website or your blog in a simple but effective way to make your prospects want to take a closer interest in your products/services!

3. Build Christmas-specific landing pages

You'll want to have several landing pages to run tests on, so rather than doing everything at the last minute, do them now . This will allow you to start your holiday marketing with a wide selection of data.

The sooner you are able to stop low-performing pages and identify the most effective ones, the sooner you can direct your traffic to the highest-performing landing pages. You need to make sure you have identified your best chances with the rush of the holiday season.

4. Optimize your product photos

The image of the product is a decisive element in whether or not to make a purchase. While your traffic will likely double to your site during the holidays, make sure all your product photos are high quality and load quickly.

Also make sure your product photos display large, especially on mobile.

5. Create a special Christmas pop-up

Pop-ups aren't always popular, but when used well and sending the right message, they can easily satisfy Internet users.

Remember that Christmas is a busy time and consumers are on the lookout for discount coupons, promotions, etc. So why not serve them all this on a silver platter?


Create a pop-up especially for the holiday season, and for it to work, focus your attention on:

  • Size: it should not be too big, ideally no more than half the screen.
  • The title: it must contain your offer and be big enough to attract attention.
  • The call-to-action: it must be clear.

Your pop-up can offer flash sales , private sales, a reduction, a gift or any personalized offer that meets the expectations of your customers.

6. Maximize up-selling and cross-selling

To encourage your visitors to buy more and thus increase your sales and turnover, you must focus on up-selling and cross-selling . Indeed, it is always easier to sell to a current customer than to a newcomer.


Remember, however, that not all products can be sold through up-selling and cross-selling. Those meeting one of the following three criteria will do:

  • Your “best seller” products : the best-selling product is certainly your best product. Since many customers buy it, you have a greater chance of it being purchased again.
  • Your top-rated products : Consumers have increased trust in recommendations. Products with many and good reviews will convince them more easily.
  • Your most relevant products : you need to identify what is really relevant for each of your customers. This takes time but today many tools exist to automate this task.

7. Offer limited-time Christmas offers

The Christmas period only lasts for a while and you must take advantage of this characteristic.

By creating sales and offers limited in time, your consumers will be afraid of missing out and will then make a purchase more quickly.


8. Make delivery costs attractive

During the Christmas period, show generosity by reducing delivery costs or even offering them as gifts.

However, don't worry because there are different ways to "remove" these fees without the impact being too significant on your margin. You can :

  • Offer delivery from a certain amount;
  • Include the amount of fees in the price of the product;
  • Reserve free delivery for certain geographic areas;
  • Book free delivery for subscribers;
  • Offer delivery on certain products only.

To find out more about these different techniques, do not hesitate to read our article E-commerce: 6 strategies to limit shopping cart abandonment .

9. Reassure customers about delivery times

One of the biggest fears consumers have at Christmas concerns delivery times. They want to be sure to receive the gift in time to put it under the tree, or their template to integrate it into their newsletter.

Christmas is an intense time for all professions. To this end, it must prepare now to meet your objectives and allow you to increase your turnover.

If you need help implementing your marketing strategy, call on responsive freelance providers , whether for:

  • Create content;
  • Dress up your site in Christmas colors;
  • Launch a campaign on social networks;
  • Develop an emailing strategy.

What if you offered delivery to your customers for Christmas? One more opportunity to communicate and convince all your prospects to make a purchase!


10. Make sure your e-commerce is mobile-friendly

This Christmas, be ready to welcome mobile internet users. With more than 30 million mobile users in France, be sure that a large proportion will identify their future purchases via their smartphone during their break or on public transport. Some will even take advantage of these moments of latency to order a gift or contact a company that they will need at the end of the year.

Make sure your content looks great on the small screen. Testing your site with Google's mobile-friendly test is a good start, but you also need to test your user experience with real visitors.

Ask friends, family, employees, and complete strangers to access your site through their mobile devices. Then do them:

  • Navigate your pages;
  • Access your offers;
  • Send forms;
  • Communicate with your business, etc.

You need to have honest feedback: if something is wrong, they should tell you. Internet users during the holiday season are in a shopping mentality. So you need to make sure that they don't get frustrated or bored on your website.

11. Offer interactive mobile content

Don’t hesitate to create more “snackable” seasonal content that entertains your users. Also remember to be visible and stand out from the crowd so that your content stands out during this very noisy time.

What tools for this?

  • Google Trends and the keyword generator to refine its semantics;
  • Feedly and Pocket to centralize your research in one place;
  • IFTTT to automate its search or distribution of its content;
  • Canva to produce visuals that stand out;
  • Hootsuite for cross-platform distribution.

12. Set up email marketing campaigns

What would Christmas be without sending a promotional email campaign? You must quickly plan a schedule for your emailing strategy . Think now about the promotions you are going to put in place and how to organize personalized offers.

There's a good chance that your email offers and funnels during the holiday season will look a little different than your traditional campaigns. For example, your traditional funnel might reach the consumer every 10 days with an offer, but during that specific period, you're going to have to be a little more aggressive.

Also think about the campaigns that will need to be boosted:

  1. Social media competitions
  2. Promotion code for a limited time

Feel free to write your emails in advance. Take the time to plan and think about the best way to attract and convert your traffic from your email campaign. Sending a bunch of emails at the last minute will give you a terrible and very low conversion rate.


13. Don’t forget about retargeting

Retargeting consists of displaying advertising banners on websites after an Internet user has shown interest in a product on another site . Retargeting ad conversion rates are impressive! Reason why you need to get started.

It also works with emailing ( abandoned carts, emails presenting complementary products, etc.).

14. If you haven't already done so, start content marketing

Too many e-retailers do not do it at all or not well. Indeed, we cannot approach content marketing the way we approach the purchase of keywords on Google Ads or the purchase of space in general. It is a long-term approach, naturally less ROI because it is less quantifiable but more sustainable and allows for the creation of intrinsic value for e-retailers.

To do this, use tools like WordPress or a blog engine. They constitute the basis of content marketing. Use the WooCommerce plugin , linked to WordPress, or PrestaShop .

To promote content, use marketing automation solutions like Responsys or Webmecanik depending on the size of your website.


15. Plan content marketing for the end of the year

It's never too early to start planning your holiday content marketing . Start working on it now and you can have all your blog posts scheduled in advance.

You'll also want to consider increasing your posting frequency during this time. This is a strategy that deserves thought in advance, particularly with the SEO manager of your team.

Your blog articles, the content of your product sheets and your sales pitches must fit this festive period. Consider offering useful articles with Christmas-oriented advice. For example, you will need to create content around specific keywords during this holiday season.

Thus, an e-retailer could very well offer a list of gifts to offer by profile (dad, mom, geek, teenager, etc.) with obviously products offered in his store. While a freelance graphic designer can write an article on how to create a beautiful Christmas newsletter.


16. Schedule messages on your social networks

If you're not using an automated social media tool , it's time to start!

For example, you can opt for Hootsuite: it will cost you less than $120 per year and will allow you to plan your messages well in advance. You don't need to automate for all social networks, but it's nice to know that you always have posts scheduled that can spark interaction and bring traffic to your site.

Holiday-specific images , hashtags, and messages are key. Your approach will be a little different during this time.

Don't be afraid to make offers . People will be looking for promotions: by using the right hashtags and keywords, you can easily attract them to you.


17. Optimize your Google Ads ads

At Christmas, it's war! All companies want to awaken the buying spirit of their prospects and compete in imagination to achieve this.

To this end, do not hesitate to invest in advertising campaigns, either by purchasing keywords in Google Ads , or by sponsoring publications on social networks where your target is mainly located. Here are some tips to help you optimize your ads!

Enable dynamic search network ads

Dynamic Search Network Ads allow the automatic creation of keywords and ads based on the content of a landing page. Using this feature, any keywords you may have forgotten are automatically added.

This tool is very useful for companies whose websites are rich in content.

Use Google Ads price extensions

Thanks to the Google Ads price extension, you can present your different offers on the same product or service by directly displaying their price in the results pages.

Extensions allow you to present the extent of your range of products and services to Internet users at a glance, in order to boost your sales.


Optimize bidding on every device

Internet users are making more and more purchases from their mobile. Research carried out upstream, to compare different sites offering the same product, is increasing. Companies must therefore integrate this reality into their strategy.

The second factor to take into account is that CPCs are lower for mobiles. Marketing budgets must therefore be carefully allocated.

Change keyword match

At certain times of the year, it is essential to broaden the scope of queries so that your products appear consistently in search engines.

Leverage Google Search Partners

To increase the click-through rate of your ads, do not hesitate to use search partners for your Google Ads ads. In fact, you benefit from the possibility of distributing these on sites that have no link with Google.


Don't Overlook Showcase Shopping

The Google Shopping format allows people to explore more products.

Unlike the old version which only allowed the display of a single product, the Google Ads update allows you to present several visuals of the same range of products.

Regularly analyze your ad statistics

To optimize your conversion rate, it is essential to import Google Analytics data into Ads. You therefore have an overview of your statistics (click-through or conversion rate, etc.) to evaluate them and guide your decisions.

The analysis of data from advertising campaigns must focus on the time slot and days of the week. You will then be able to determine the ideal time to offer auctions and optimize your return on investment.

18. Put the emphasis on the packaging!

Don't disappoint your customers by delivering them a neutral package that reflects every ordinary day of the year... It's Christmas!

Take the opportunity to add a touch of cheerfulness to your packaging/parcels, such as glitter, paper snowflakes, a red and green ribbon in Christmas colors, etc. Make your customers want to order from you again.


19. Put yourself in the shoes of your audience

Don't think first about what you want to sell. Try to put yourself in your audience's shoes and think about the issues that really interest them.

  • What benefits will you offer them?
  • Why will they enjoy reading the content?
  • What will they get out of it?
  • What will make them say “I did a good job of reading this content”?

For monitoring, social media, infographics, content platforms, but also to manage your editorial schedules or back and forth with your clients, use tools such as these:


20. Do A/B testing

Google Ads, Facebook Ads, or even marketing automation tools allow you to carry out A/B tests on your advertising campaigns , your landing pages and your emails .

Use these features to identify the most relevant formula to meet your objectives with your target.

21. Control your e-commerce stocks

At Christmas, you will be overwhelmed by orders and express deliveries. Prepare for this now by investing in all the necessary packing materials and warning your friends that they won't be seeing you as much for a while.

Also plan the stock . It would be stupid to be out of business in the first few weeks! If it's your first Christmas, look at the trends and analyze the best sales of the year to plan the right stock. For more experienced e-retailers, we come back to point 1: evaluate previous years to better organize yourself.

On an e-commerce site, the user experience must be optimal. To do this, it is essential to regularly check that the products displayed on your site and in the Google Shopping feed are in stock. If not, you may lose some sales.


22. Stay organized and focused this Christmas season

Don't try to take advantage of Christmas to sell to the masses. It won't do any good! Just address your target, like all year round. Better to focus on a smaller, but qualified, target.

23. Adapt your e-commerce strategy according to your activity

Companies for which the Christmas holiday period is crucial in terms of turnover must anticipate this period by offering suitable content:

  • Advent calendars ;
  • Lists for Santa Claus;
  • Gift tips ;
  • Travel advice;
  • Holiday preparation checklists;
  • Recipes…

You won't be the only one implementing a Christmas marketing strategy. So, try to have a different approach from competitors and stand out with original communication.

Do the same in terms of the products and offers offered, trying to think outside the box and offering packs or items that others don't have (in addition to the great classics, of course!).

24. Thank your customers and partners

Don't forget that it's Christmas... but especially the end of the year! If your business is thriving, it is not only thanks to your efforts, yes. But it is above all thanks to your partners, and even more thanks to your customers. Don't you think this is a good opportunity to thank them?

25. Anticipate the day after Christmas

The period following the end-of-year holidays should not be neglected! Customers who have ordered from you will probably have the opportunity to come back if you have given yourself the means to convince them.


Conclusion

Remember that from now on, every day counts: we are quickly approaching Christmas!

So don't hesitate to apply our advice if you haven't already done so to increase your sales.
Obviously, not all of the practices mentioned in this article are mandatory. Everything must be in line with your strategy already in place.

What if you called on a community manager or a professional editor to prepare your website and social networks as the end-of-year holidays approach?