Holiday sales are extremely important for online businesses. This is the time of year when you get a big boost in sales and you don’t want to miss out on your piece of the multi-billion dollar pie! There are some common problems that many online retailers face for Holiday sales.

1. Starting too late: This is the biggest one. Every year in July, we recommend that if you are going to start an online business, you should get started in the summer in order to catch the most Holiday sales. It’s true! In order to get your store completed, have your marketing plan together and started and get your SEO completed, you are already nearing the Holiday selling season. It takes time to get your online store perfected, and ready for the masses. So if you start too late, you will have to wait until next year!

2. Forgetting about Mobile Shoppers:  This was one of my 7 Deadly Sins of Store Design mishaps and it takes place here too. Mobile shopping is on the rise and many people are turning to mobile devices to search for products to buy and to purchase directly from their smartphones or tablets. If your online store isn’t mobile shopping friendly, you will miss out on these customers because they will be frustrated by searching your site. Most everyone has some sort of mobile device these days, so test your store out and see how your customers would interact with it and make corrections specifically for them.

3. No Marketing Plan: Having no marketing plan is like trying to build a house with no blueprint. Every online store owner needs to have a marketing plan put together and scheduled out. Emails, campaigns, ads, blogs, newsletters….these are just some of the marketing pieces that every online store owner needs. If you don’t have your marketing plan put together for Holiday Sales and you haven’t even begun working on it, you need to hurry. The closer that the Holiday Sales season nears, the less time you have to implement it. You should have your marketing plan for Holiday sales done extremely early in the year or the year before, and scheduled out to work on it a little bit at a time. Don’t procrastinate and don’t forget about all of the OTHER holidays!

4. Don’t Forget to Decorate your Store!: Just like decorating your Christmas Tree and your house every year for Christmas and other holidays, you should decorate your store too. Beautiful graphics representing the season inspire customers to purchase more. Everyone likes the warm, fuzzy feeling that Christmas brings, so try to emulate that in your store. Also, don’t forget that you shouldn’t just dress up your home page. Put something on EVERY page or just on your top landing pages to get the most eyes on it.

5. Don’t Neglect Last Minute Shoppers:  Many people wait until the last minute to buy gifts. So if you feel confident about delivery before Christmas, make sure that your customers know that. I’m sure that you have seen on popular shopping sites…. Order by this date to get it before Christmas! Don’t forget to do that as well so if your customers are shopping around, they will already know that their gift will arrive in time if they shop from your store, but another store may not state that, and they will be back!