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It’s no secret that inflation and supply chain issues have made holiday predictions more difficult. Meanwhile, managing an eCommerce website during the holidays has become increasingly complex, with more and more ways to shop online and in person.
Despite these new challenges, the eCommerce holidays are shaping up to be a fun and wild time. You’ll want to make sure you’re ready for whatever may happen and start working on your eCommerce holiday readiness ASAP.
To help you out, our team of eCommerce experts has put together a list of tips to prepare your online store for this holiday season. Keep reading for ideas on how to make your store stand out and turn casual browsers into regular buyers.
Understanding eCommerce holiday readiness
Your business website is your brand’s flagship destination, where shoppers can find the most comprehensive selection of products and engaging content. As the eCommerce holidays approach, your site needs to be ready for the surge in traffic. Achieving eCommerce holiday readiness means optimizing your loading speeds, making sure your site is mobile responsive and able to handle the extra load of visitors.
It also means prepping other aspects of your business, including your website, inventory, logistics and marketing campaigns. Ultimately, you want to check that everything is running smoothly before a tidal wave of orders comes.
The 15-step eCommerce holiday checklist
01. Prepare for an influx of traffic
There’s nothing worse than a site outage, especially during something big like a small business Black Friday sale event or a major product promotion. An outage doesn’t just prevent customers from completing a purchase—studies show that brand trust is heavily impacted by site speed, so a glitchy or slow-loading site can put your reputation at risk. Poor site performance can even impact brand visibility, since Google factors in page speed when deciding on page rankings.
To avoid unwelcome surprises, test your website across multiple devices and install any third-party eCommerce apps early on. Avoid launching new apps or rejiggering your site in the middle of the peak season, when most people are interacting with your store.
In addition to this, get your analytics in order. Connect your site to Google Analytics and other preferred tools that will help you understand who’s landing on your site during the holidays. Familiarize yourself with helpful reports, including the ones available with Wix Analytics, so you know where to look whenever you want to investigate site traffic, sales and/or site performance.
02. Get your mobile site ready
This holiday season is set to be the most mobile-driven yet, with a record $128.1 billion expected to be spent via mobile devices, according to the Adobe Forecast. This would account for 53.2% of online sales.
You’ll therefore want to cater to customers on-the-go by auditing and optimizing your mobile store. Ensure that your product pages are easy to find with a few taps. Avoid overcrowded or hard-to-read pages. Audit mobile loading times, and simplify menus and page elements to account for smaller screens.
Want to give your site a holiday makeover? Check out these eCommerce website templates to create a festive shopping experience that attracts customers.
03. Make sure that products are easy to find
Make it easy for your customers to discover relevant products by offering multiple pathways for finding the perfect gift. Features like video lookbooks, quizzes and gift guides can be very useful for shoppers who arrive at your site without a specific product in mind. When learning how to sell online successfully, particularly during the holiday season, these eCommerce tools can make a big difference.
Alternatively, add “best sellers” or “related products” recommendations that can cross-sell or upsell buyers as they’re browsing your site. Or, add decorative flash sale banners and countdown clocks to your site that draw attention to your products, plus special deals.
Learn how to add a related products gallery to your Wix site, or install an app like Reconvert that’s compatible with Wix and provides even more ways to increase AOV.
For shoppers who already know what they want, your navigation menus and search bars should feature seasonal items or promos, including links to gift cards and themed collections.
04. Fine tune your product pages
The holidays aren’t the time to skimp out on your product pages. Publish robust product pages that contain everything that shoppers need to know to confidently make a purchase. Some ideas for strengthening your product pages:
Include detailed descriptions that avoid generic superlatives like “great” or “excellent” and instead demonstrate what makes your products unique. If you’re in a creative rut, use an AI-powered solution like Wix’s text creator to help turn your thoughts into easy-to-read descriptions.
Touch up your photos using tools like Wix’s AI-powered image features, which let you crop or extend images, improve the resolution and/or erase objects from the background of a photo (among other things).
Add a pre-order or a “notify when back in stock” option for not-yet-released or popular items that might sell out quickly, respectively (learn how to allow pre-ordering on your Wix site or set up back-in-stock notifications on Wix).
Experiment with helpful elements like product comparison matrices, how-to videos and in-depth content about how your products are sourced (if appropriate).
Clearly show delivery timelines or local pickup options, so shoppers know all of their options upfront.
Clearly link to your return and refund policy, so first-time customers feel more confident about shopping with your brand.
05. Put your best offer on the table
With inflation causing record-high prices, consumers are on the hunt for ways to save: 91% of Americans check for discounts before making an online purchase, according to research by Capital One Shopping, and 80% of American shoppers say they’d be open to buying from a brand for the first time if offered a discount.
Offering a discount can help convince your shoppers to hit “buy.” Remember, however, to balance the incentives carefully. While deep price cuts can drive holiday sales volume, they can also set the wrong expectations with new customers. New customers may expect low prices year-round if you’re not careful.
During the holidays, free shipping is an especially attractive offer. In fact, recent eCommerce statistics show that nine out of 10 consumers say free shipping is the top incentive to shop online. Online consumers are also six times more likely to value free shipping over fast shipping, and most (93%) will buy additional items just to qualify for free shipping, reports Capital One Shopping.
Of course, it’s important that you protect your eCommerce profit margins. So, deploy free shipping offers strategically for limited-time periods or for purchases above a spending threshold.
More tips:
06. Optimize the checkout process
A simple, clear checkout process is paramount to closing the sale. In fact, roughly 20% of shoppers abandon their carts because the checkout process is too complex.
To avoid losing sales in the final stretch, design a checkout flow that caters to various payment preferences and devices. Connect Wix Payments to accept major debit/credit cards, PayPal, digital wallets, BNPL and other popular forms of payment. If you have a brick-and-mortar store, use Wix Point-of-Sale to ensure synchronization between your online and offline transactions.
When it comes to the eCommerce checkout experience, be mindful of the amount of information you require to complete a purchase. Opt for a shorter, simpler flow that only requires essential details. For optional settings—such subscription opt-ins or “save cards on file”—present these as checkboxes that require minimal effort on the buyer’s part.
More tips:
07. Enhance your inventory flows
In normal times, inventory management can already be difficult. The holidays only add to the pressure—and safe to say, you won’t want to be testing shoppers’ patience.
Protect your brand from overselling, late shipments and other costly mishaps by setting up the right inventory flows ahead of time. Harness inventory management tools that can automatically sync quantities across your sales channels. Connect with your 3PL or suppliers and discuss ways to ensure order accuracy, fast shipping and custom packaging if necessary. Set reorder points, reserve safety stock and even accept pre-orders to keep your inventory in check.
If you’re looking to take a more hands-off approach and potentially expand your holiday offerings, you can always explore dropshipping or print on demand. Both allow you to outsource storage and fulfillment and only pay for what gets sold.
More inventory management tips:
08. Send inventory to fulfillment centers early
While forecasting demand is tricky, it’s crucial to get an early start and stock up on your merchandise, especially if you plan to run any special promotions during the holidays. It’s also your responsibility to move stock to where it’s likely to be needed most, whether that entails your physical stores, fulfillment centers or local warehouses.
Send ample amounts of stock to each provider and make sure any shipping partners are aware of upcoming discounts or marketing campaigns that might spike sales. Be mindful of cutoff dates for partners like Amazon FBA that require holiday inventory to be sent early. Double-check that your items and packaging comply with 3PL requirements to prevent any foreseeable delays, and test your order management system to ensure shipments are routed properly.
09. Sell in-person with Wix Point-of-Sale
While times have changed, physical retail is no less valuable. Warby Parker, Everlane and even Amazon are just some of the brands establishing physical stores to grow their business.
Even if you don’t have a physical footprint year-round, the holidays are ideal for temporary store formats. Think: standalone pop-ups, mobile units or “store within store” concepts like the recent matchups between Kohl’s and Sephora or Macy’s and Toys “R” Us. Holiday craft fairs and markets present other opportunities.
Whether your physical sales location is a temporary experiment or a permanent community fixture, take advantage of Wix Point of Sale (POS). Wix POS offers both mobile and docked solutions for accepting payments wherever you sell, and keeping orders, prices and quantities consistent across channels.
10. Expand pickup and delivery options
Nearly a quarter of online holiday orders were fulfilled using “Buy Online, Pickup In-Store” (aka BOPIS) in 2022—and for good reason. BOPIS offers a fast, free fulfillment option for customers, while minimizing shipping costs for sellers. Given that BOPIS users may be inclined to purchase additional items while in store, this strategy can be a revenue-winner.
If you have physical locations, see if offering store or curbside pickup makes sense. Pair this with other shipping options, taking care to update your shipping policies (e.g., your delivery timeframes, delivery areas and costs) for the holidays. Tip: to help level your shipping costs, you can require minimum order values to qualify for specific delivery options.
11. Set up your multichannel strategy
While your online store is your digital home, you’re likely to attract a wider audience if you branch out to other popular destinations like Amazon, eBay and others.
Google once found that during the holidays, 54% of consumers used at least five channels to search for gifts in the course of a typical two-day period. So, the more locations your brand can be found, the greater your chances of driving new business.
That said, you don’t need to be on every channel, whether through ads or native product listings. Focus on where your target audience already hangs out online. See if your eCommerce platform offers native integrations or tools for managing multichannel sales to simplify your work. As you expand to more channels, you’ll want to familiarize yourself with how items are ranked, displayed and promoted on those channels.
Make sure your product listings and promotions are synchronized; the goal is to offer an intriguing assortment of items across channels, without undercutting your core eCommerce site business. Themed selections, trending items and unique gift picks are all good options to showcase on third-party channels.
More tips:
12. Schedule email campaigns to boost conversions and loyalty
Email is the quiet workhorse of eCommerce marketing: 47.5% of marketers report that it’s still very effective for achieving business goals (across many types of eCommerce businesses), according to Hubspot. Context and timing are crucial, so use early-season campaign results to better hone subsequent promotions.
“The most powerful marketing action you can take is to think of the entire holiday season as one large, multi-part campaign,” advises Mike Rossi, co-founder and CEO of Smile.io, a Wix partner.
“Before you draft your first email, you need to have a cohesive plan for what you’re going to do with the results of that first campaign. How will you market to newly acquired pre-Black Friday shoppers in the coming months to retain them? Do you want to reactivate past customers during Black Friday and Cyber Monday when everyone else is marketing to them, or hold off until the post-holiday season when sales are typically lower?”
“Having a cohesive plan to know which of your customers you want to market to at each point of the holiday season is crucial if you want to make the most of this critical time for your brand,” Rossi adds.
When you’re ready to set up your email campaigns, Wix’s AI email tools can lend a hand in designing and writing catchy holiday emails. Alternatively, apps like Klaviyo can help you further segment and personalize your emails, in addition to SMS.
13. Offer gift cards with cross-channel flexibility
In uncertain times, gift cards are a reliable hit. These days, gift cards are no longer just presents for other people—21.2% of gift card buyers intend to use those cards on themselves to access certain discounts, manage their money better or receive other benefits.
This year the trend is set to continue, so offering gift cards and highlighting them prominently is a smart move. Even smarter: allowing shopping credits to be used both in-store and online, regardless of the gift card format.
14. Leverage content to inspire holiday cheer
Content such as videos, blog posts and gift guides can be useful for a number of reasons. Not only do they inspire your customers to take action, but they also help you to powerfully reach new audiences.
Establish a holiday content calendar that can help you engage customers in a number of ways. Consider partnering with another brand or influencer for unboxing videos, blog features, live stream and other collaborative content. Or, invite user-generated content (UGC) by asking your customers for reviews, launching a hashtag campaign and hosting a contest through which participants can win rewards by creating or sharing content around your brand.
Tools like Wix’s AI blogging and image tools can further speed up the process of creating new, attractive content. Just remember to prioritize quality over quantity; every piece you publish should provide value to your buyers and remain on-brand.
15. Get social
More than half of 2021 consumers (58%) said that they planned to turn to social media for gift inspiration during the holiday season, according to McKinsey. With the meteoric rise of channels like TikTok and ever-more-seamless tools to buy within social apps, you can expect that number to grow this holiday season.
To focus your efforts, consider which social networks your target audience already uses and what content resonates with them on those channels. Hashtag campaigns might be ideal for Instagram, while Pinterest users are more likely to pay attention to beautifully curated boards. Meanwhile, TikTok viewers might follow your brand after seeing a funny video set to a trending tune. Get creative and harness the social channels at your disposal.
Ecommerce holiday trends to boost your marketing campaigns
This holiday season, keeping up with the latest eCommerce trends is crucial for maximizing your marketing efforts. Here are a few trends to keep in mind:
Early promotions: Holiday shopping is starting earlier than ever, with many brands launching sales as early as October.
Personalized deals: Shoppers are responding more to personalized offers tailored to their preferences.
Sustainability: Eco-conscious consumers are looking for brands with sustainable packaging and products.
Omnichannel presence: Customers expect seamless shopping experiences across multiple platforms, from social media to online stores.
Your goal is to capture attention without getting lost in the noise. From email marketing to using social media to showcase limited-time offers or flash sales, focus on creating a sense of urgency and connection with your audience. You can also consider leveraging holiday-related SEO strategies to increase visibility during eCommerce holidays like Black Friday, Cyber Monday and beyond.
By tapping into current eCommerce holiday trends, you’ll increase your chances of attracting eager shoppers and driving more conversions.
Ecommerce holiday readiness FAQ
What is eCommerce readiness?
Ecommerce readiness refers to how prepared a business is to handle online sales. This includes a website that is prepared for high traffic, has secure payment options, reliable shipping methods and an overall streamlined customer experience to meet the demands of online shoppers.