Ok, first thing’s first. Unclench your jaw, relax your shoulders, and take a deep breath. This year has been a doozy! You’ve earned a breather (or 1,000). Now that that’s out of the way, can we be shocked together about the fact that the holidays are already, once again, somehow, right around the corner? 2020, who do you think you are?
Obviously, this year looks quite a bit different than usual given the current state of the world, and it’s important to keep that in mind when advertising to your customer base. Consumer behaviors continue to shift and thus, businesses need to adjust. Because this means potentially more work for you as the marketer, it’s crucial that you prepare as much as possible to protect your time (and sanity) this holiday season.
Given that Black Friday is already upon us (with many more holidays to follow), we figured now is the perfect time to share a list of tips and optimizations the Seer team is putting in place across our clients’ paid campaigns to account for the 2020 holidays.
💡 “For the first 10 days of the holiday shopping season, US consumers spent $21.7 billion online - a 21% YoY jump according to Adobe Analytics. This likely stems from the fact that 63% of consumers are avoiding stores and buying more online, with health concerns due to the pandemic driving that decision for 81%.” 💡
Tips to Drive Performance
Minimize the Customer’s Wait to Grow Profit
- Test your site speed
- 74% of website visitors will leave if your page doesn’t load within the first 5 seconds. Be sure to test the site speed before any big sales or holiday promotions so you’re prepared for the influx of traffic!
- Keep mobile in mind
- According to Adobe, “mobile devices drove 84% of the online sales growth in 2019’s holiday season.”
- If you’re like most accounts at Seer and run campaigns on Smart Bidding, Google will automatically make these adjustments for you and go after mobile users.
Not leveraging automated bidding yet? Get on it! Choose the right smart bidding strategy, set the right seasonal budgets, plan the right targets, and consider additional tools for success.
- Enable credit card memory
- Put yourself in your customers’ shoes - wouldn’t you be a little annoyed if a site you’ve already purchased from didn’t remember your details?
Maximize Consumer-Perceived Value to Retain Customers Throughout the Year
- Offer “free” shipping
- Of course, this isn’t going to be feasible for every business, but if you can swing it, this goes a long way to establish brand loyalty.
- Give away small gift cards at checkout so customers have a reason to come back
- Gift cards? Enough said.
- Offer referral specials like a store credit or a discount for customers to refer friends
- This is a huge motivator for users to choose your brand over another that may be similar across the board but doesn’t offer a referral option! This may be the deciding factor for you to earn new customers.
Fight Against Abandoned Carts
- Don’t have extra fees at checkout
- According to B2C, nearly 30% of online shoppers abandon their cart when hit with extra fees at checkout. Yikes! Don’t be that guy.
- Enable a save-cart functionality so customers can jump in right where they had left off
- It may sound like a small lift, but this site optimization removes one more layer of friction for the customer, making his or her experience that much more enjoyable, thus making them a returning customer.
- Keep the cart visible as a constant reminder for people to checkout
- Let's take it back to Psych 101. Out of sight, out of mind, and less likely to follow through with checking out. Make those carts visible to your customer!
Obviously there is a whole slew of optimizations and preparation that goes into any Q4, but we hope the list above helps get you started!
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