It seems like the holiday season is starting earlier and earlier each year. American consumers heavily anticipate the final 60 days of the year with Black Friday, Thanksgiving, Cyber Monday, Christmas, and New Years all going back to back to back. The holiday season is also a big two months for businesses, as a significant portion of their yearly sales is produced during this eight-week stretch.
Time is money, so let’s go ahead and break down what you can do to prepare your website for the antsy holiday shoppers.
1. Check With Your Hosting Service
This should be your number one priority… Ensuring that your hosting plan is capable of handling large influxes or spikes in website traffic is vital to the functionality of your site. Nothing diminishes a user experience more than long load times, broken pages, and worst of all — a crashed website. So contact your host provider and ask about your current service plan, and absolutely upgrade your bandwidth if you’re not set to handle the expected web visitors.
2. Security, Security, Security
Besides a broken website, a lack of security is a sure-fire way to strike out on potential website conversions and sales. If people don’t see the “green lock” in the web address, their opinion of the website’s credibility is sure to nosedive. That’s why doubling-down on security measures is always a good idea, regardless of the season. So be sure to install SSL on your server and force all your webpages to HTTPS. Providing proper professionalism and security measures will help consumers feel safe in your web environment, and increase the odds they decide to spend money on you.
3. Treat Mobile Like a King
Americans have quickly traded their computers for mobile devices. In the last five years alone, mobile devices have proliferated, while making large leaps in technology advancements. This has lead to an increase in mobile device usage for shopping, banking, payments, etc. In 2019, over half of all internet traffic is generated through mobile devices. The rise of mobile e-commerce has blossomed in what seems like overnight. Today, a large portion of buying happens on an iPhone. Due to this reality, websites NEED to cater to the mobile user. The functionality must deliver a positive and engaging experience. If your website lacks an easy to use mobile view, you’re putting holes in your pocket.
4. Identify an SEO Strategy for the Holiday Season
Smart SEO campaigns can generate a lot of buzz and traction around your website. Developing and implementing an SEO strategy takes time, and seeing those results takes months. This process needs to start in August or September, not the start of the holiday season, but even if you haven’t thought about a specific SEO holiday strategy, you’re not completely out of luck. You can still perform some keyword research and adjust on-page content, meta descriptions, and title tags in a couple of days, which will push some good traffic your way.
5. Chatbots and Customer Service Are Key
Holiday season sales are synonymous with customer service. From questions regarding inventory and shipping to returns and refunds, customers will be knocking at your door. One of the best investments you can make for your website during the holidays is incorporating an on-page chatbot to field comments, questions, and concerns. This technology relieves some of the pressure on staff and helps customers receive instantaneous support. It’s always more expensive and harder to gain a new customer versus a returning customer — good (and timely) customer service is one of the best ways to keep their business.
6. Track Your Website Progress and Production
This is a beneficial move for this holiday season, and especially next. You need to ensure that you have a system in place to track your website analytics. Whether that is Google Analytics or another program, knowing figures like: page visitors, time on page, conversions, bounce rate, etc. is valuable to understanding what on your website is working, and what’s not. From there you can adjust to find the right formula to better improve your website performance.
Need Help Improving Your Website?
At Venta Marketing, we are helping businesses meet their goals head-on. As leaders in the digital marketing industry, we know what a great website looks and acts like. We understand how navigating the digital market can be overwhelming. Our mission is to help simplify the equation and connect quality leads to quality businesses. Contact us today to inquire about how we can help improve your website.