Twas two weeks before Christmas, and round the whole mall,
Sighs of worry were huffed by managers all.
“Perhaps,” they did worry, “It’s too late for new sales!
Are there any shoppers left who can save our flustered tails?”
It’s less than two weeks to Christmas! Have you reached your holiday sales targets yet? If not, don’t worry – you’ve still got time, and there’s plenty left that you can do. 3.5% of consumers will shop these last two weeks, which doesn’t seem like much, but Starbucks sold two million gift cards last Christmas Eve alone, so it’s still a significant amount of people shopping.
I put together a list of simple things you can do to encourage people to continue shopping with you, even as we get right down to the deadline. Every single one of these things is totally actionable for the final two weeks of the holiday season, so get reading and get cracking! You’ve got targets to make!
1. Extend your hours.
via Mark Morgan, Flickr
Many of your last-minute Christmas shoppers will be outside of your normal customers, which means they will likely shop at different hours than your usual demographics. For instance, if your store usually caters to moms of elementary school kids, your peak hours are probably from 10am-2pm, and perhaps 4:30pm-6:30pm. However, during the last two weeks of Christmas, you may find the moms’ partners prefer shopping between 12pm-1pm, and 6pm-9pm, and the grandmas prefer shopping from 8am-12pm. If you’re usually only open from 10am-7pm, you’re missing out on four hours of shoppers!
Before you decide on this, there’s a few things you should do:
- Figure out your overhead, if you don’t already know it. You want to ensure you can make enough sales for running the electricity and manning the floor to be worth it.
- Check in with your floor people to find out if they’ve seen a surprising amount of people knocking on the door either before the doors are opened in the morning, or after the doors were closed at night. (Chances are, they have.)
- Test it out! Unfortunately, extending your hours isn’t something your can know for sure works until you’ve tried it out, because it’s impossible to gather the necessary data unless you do. The last two weeks before Christmas are the perfect time to add an hour at the end of your day. It’s low risk, and can provide you with clear idea of what to do next year. Worst comes to worst you have about 14 extra hours you have to pay for.
2. Create special products purposefully for last minute gift-buyers.
Last minute gift buyers typically:
- Don’t have a lot of time.
- Are finishing up their holiday shopping, rather than starting it, so are looking for items for the person who is impossible to buy for, or a few small items to round out someone’s gift pile.
- And often are shopping in stores they are unfamiliar with because that’s where mom/dad/partner/kid/friend wants an item from.
With that in mind, you can set about making sure this type of shopper can walk into your store and find it incredibly convenient.
First, you should make sure that your gift cards are clearly displayed and easy to find. Most stores put their gift cards up at the register, so that’s where people are trained to look for them. Make sure you at least have part of your gift cards there. Additionally, putting gift cards at the register makes for an easy add-on sale for anyone already purchasing something.
Next, channel your inner Taylor Swift and put together some items from around your store into a gift basket or package.
If possible, price all these things as one item. If that’s not possible, use it as a display showcase to give shoppers ideas, or coordinate your basket with sales already going on (i.e. create a basket out of items that are all on promo). Make sure to display these baskets at the front of the store (or department), to lure in last minute shoppers, and by the registers, for impulse buys.
Here are some ideas for potential baskets to get you rolling:
- A men’s business clothing store could put together “The Essential Gentleman’s Accessories for Under $100” box, with a tie clip, silk tie, pocket square, wrist cuffs, and bow tie. (Please note that baskets should be generally devoid of sized items, as many of the shoppers at this time may have no idea what sizes their recipients are. At most, use S, M, L, XL-type sizing on clothing, like pajamas, where sizing matters less.)
- A gardening shop could create “The Gardener’s Best Friends” basket with a trowel, potting soil, hand rake, and Japanese gardener’s knife.
- A children’s toy shop could make, “The Ultimate Toy Box for Toddlers,” and include blocks, large-piece puzzles, and some favorite children’s story books.
Finally, make sure all your small, knick-knacky items are well-displayed. Knick-knacky items and accessories make fantastic presents, both because they’re small, and also because they are often budget friendly. So consider making a display up at the front of your store with these (like this knick-knack Christmas tree you can create for cheap), and definitely make sure they’re displayed at your register for impulse buys.
3. Run an email campaign.
Spend a little bit of time coming up with a short email marketing campaign you can blast out over the next few days. Send out emails reminding people of your ongoing sales. Or try sending out emails filled with last-minute Christmas gift ideas, like the baskets I mentioned above, or other quick items you have in your inventory.
This is one Gap sent me that I particularly like. Unfortunately, it was at the bottom of an email, instead of being sent as it’s own email.
This email campaign will obviously be sent to people who have at least shopped with you once before, given that’s how you got their email, so you may want to include some emails about treating oneself during the holiday season. (Think: “Sweaters are give one, keep one this week!” “Buy $100 today, and receive a free surprise gift!”)
4. Run a social campaign.
Engage your followers on social media with content similar to what you might run in an email campaign. Run a countdown, or offer special discounts to your followers.
Additionally, consider running an ad campaign to attract last minute shoppers from a wider net. Facebook advertising is very cheap, can reach a very targeted audience, and can be set up in a matter of minutes. For the most success, limit your targeting very tightly. If you’re a brick and mortar store, make sure to layer in regional targeting as specific as 20-50 miles from your location.
While you will likely want to put a coupon as your call-to-action throughout any and all ads you run, you may want to segment your campaigns out a bit depending on who you are capable of targeting. You’re likely able to target your usual customer best, as you know them well, so make sure to run a campaign like: “Looking for last minute gifts? Save $15 on X!” If possible, you should also target those who want to buy gifts for your usual customer. For instance, a women’s clothing store may want to run an ad targeting their usual customer’s partners: “Looking for a last minute gift for that special someone? Save $15 on the perfect gift for her!” However, targeting an ad at someone who is not your usual customer may be trickier, as you are less likely to know their interests, occupations, etc.
Check out this example from my own feed of an excellent ad targeted at someone’s partner. (There is no possible way that I have anything on my Facebook that would make targeting this product at me make sense. But my husband would love this product. So marketing it to me as a gift idea is genius.)
5. Give a great experience to your customers to encourage word-of-mouth.
The truth is, it’s difficult for you to know who is last minute shopping, but your customers probably know quite a few other people who are. Make sure they’re suggesting your store to their friends and family as the place to go.
The best way to encourage word of mouth is simply to give your customers an experience they can’t forget, and can’t stop talking about. Make sure your sales people are trained in providing a flawless sales experience to each and every customer, but also go above and beyond to surprise and delight. Many stores simply go into survival mode during the holidays, which makes it easy to stand out above the (generally literal) noise.
- Set up beautiful displays intended to make people catch their breath and do your darnedest to keep them clean. (Mission: Impossible, I know.)
- Offer refreshments. And make them irresistible. Spend some time making homemade pastries. If possible offer vegan, gluten and/or lactose free options, to surprise those customers who are on diets or have intolerances. And remember to keep everything labelled and nut-free. (Try this vegan and lactose/gluten free banana chocolate chip bread. To make it truly irresistible to any diet preference, double the applesauce and add a banana. And maybe double the chocolate chips.)
- Make seating/entertainment available in your store. Seating is often overlooked by stores, but you wouldn’t believe what a great idea it is. Especially at the holidays, most shoppers are shopping in mixed groups. Dad comes in with his kids; Mom is out shopping with her brother; Grandpa is dragged across the mall by his teenage granddaughter. It’s a hodgepodge. And typically, at least one person in the group will vehemently not want to be in your store. By offering them a place to rest, and relax, and even materials to keep them entertained (magazines, children’s books), you will take a load off your actual customers. And who knows, you might even get some of the angry people dragged into your stores to like you.
Another way to really drive word-of-mouth, run a tell-a-friend/referral promo on social, or email. Send out a landing page with a coupon code that can only be claimed if you enter in a friend’s email to send a matching discount. Pro-tip: Give your customer a bigger discount the more emails they enter, up to a certain amount.
6. Take your store to the last minute shoppers.
In the olden days, brick and mortar retailers were trapped in the location they had chosen years ago. But nowadays, with mobile POS, the building your store is located in is no longer your old ball and chain. You can load up your mobile device and inventory, and go sell anywhere. If you’re in a location that doesn’t seem to attract many last minute shoppers, consider running a pop-up shop in a location that does get more traffic.
To be completely fair, it is a bit late in the game to do this, as you will likely have to go through some hoops to get permission to sell products on public thoroughfares. So, perhaps keep the pop-up shop on the backburner for next year, and consider this pop-up shop-lite idea:
Create a partnership with a store that’s complementary to yours (think a women’s clothing store partnering with a makeup store) in a location that gets great traffic. You can either:
- Have that store give out coupons to your store (in return for you giving out coupons to their store).
- Or, if possible, set up a very tiny “pop-up shop” within their store. Again, you can offer them the same opportunity within your store. Even if they don’t want to setup a satellite in your store, this benefits their store, as well as yours. When done right, a complementary “popup shop” can provide whimsy and fun for their shoppers. Additionally, it can help create a convenient one-stop shop. In fact, this mini shop-within-a-shop is so rock-solid that both Rent the Runway and JC Penney have permanently partnered this way with other brands.
More?
That’s my round-up of last minute things stores can actually do to increase holiday sales this season. What tips and tricks do you have for these final weeks?
The post 6 Actionable Last Minute Ways to Increase Holiday Sales appeared first on Capterra Blog.