Yahoo Finance 5 ways online retailers can prepare for the holiday rush
The pandemic has changed many facets of our lives – including the way we shop around the holidays. In fact, online sales during the 2021 season are expected to outperform the year before, due to an ever-growing desire around the world for a return to ‘normalcy’. For businesses looking to seize the opportunity in this shift in online shopping behaviour, the holiday season is the most significant time to act.
Sharing their eCommerce insights in a recently published ebook titled ‘Digitize & Thrive: Ready For The Holidays', PayPal highlights the huge potential of this period, while offering advice on how retailers can capitalise on it.
5 tips to leverage the 2021 holiday season
With many parts of the world still in limbo, the 2021 holiday selling season is expected to kick off even earlier and extend for longer, so it is crucial for online retailers to prepare with the following strategies and solutions:
1. Maximise sales and reduce cart abandonment
It comes as no surprise that December is the month with the highest level of online shopping cart abandonment, as people are likely to be busy during the holiday season.
For every one second delay on a shopping site, conversion drops by 7%, which is why online retailers should focus on delivering an optimal user experiences so that every interaction and touchpoint is easy and purposeful from start to finish. With payment being a big part of the experience, seamless checkouts and letting customers pay the way they prefer should be a given.
2. Align inventory plan with post-pandemic shopping trends
PayPal's Digitize & Thrive ebook illustrates how consumers are now spending more in different product categories due to the ongoing impact of the pandemic. Besides an overall boom in health, wellness and fitness goods, numbers show that fashion and luxury items are also seeing an uptick in sales as people start to go out for work and socialising, moving away from stay-at-home outfits.
To ensure that supply meets demand, retailers could consider segmenting audience based on their demographics and purchase history, and creating the right offers to entice them.
3. Engage customers with personalised holiday incentives
Every shopper loves a good deal – and while many retailers count on loyalty for repeat visits, they need to keep in mind that up to 48% of consumers are looking for the best prices or promotions during the holiday season.
PayPal's ebook shows that 60% of shoppers are likely to become repeat buyers after enjoying a personalised online retail experience. Such experience is created based on retailers’ insights on customer behaviour and data, which should be something front of mind for all online retailers.
4. Stay ahead of holiday fraudsters
With the spike in transactions during the holiday season, the risk of fraud - especially chargeback abuse - is likely to increase for online retailers. Based on PayPal's findings, 36% of consumers have filed false claims, which is why the right protection needs to be in place before the peak periods.
Using adaptive algorithms to distinguish fraudulent and legitimate transactions means that online retailers can enjoy peace of mind through 24/7 monitoring and detection – lowering losses overall.
5. Ramp up customer support to be ready for holiday traffic
The quality of after-sales services can make or break a business. Demand for support accelerates during the holiday season - making it crucial for online retailers to be all set to serve. One option is to explore self-service and automated solutions as 60% of customers have been found to prefer self-service than speaking with a support agent.
Making the most of holiday sales starts now
Whether it’s delivering on customer preferences or streamlining the checkout experience, preparing for the holiday rush should not be a last-ditch effort. Leveraging a trusted and robust suite of payment solutions, online retailers can equip themselves to deliver a great holiday shopping experience to their customers, which, in turn, builds long-term loyalty.
This content was produced in partnership with PayPal.
