17 Dec Black Friday 2015 Boosts Online Sales
Shop front UK retailers were in for a bit of a surprise during the 2015 Black Friday event because there was less barging through the doors and much more getting up at 4am to place an order online and return back to bed.
Just as we have reported over the past couple of years’, there has been a great increase in online sales with particular emphasis on mobile shopping.
Online sales of non-food items grew by 11.8% on 2014 and £1 in every £5 was spent in online purchases.
Many high street retail stores were empty during Black Friday and extending into Cyber Monday week because there were so many deals to be had online.
Traditionally Cyber Monday is the official ‘online’ sales event of the year but the purchasing public have decided that they prefer to bag a bargain from the comfort of their own home, office or whilst on the bus, further increasing the growing trend of omni-shopping which is shopping across multiple retail options including in store, online via mobile, desktop, tablet and apps, and they’re prepared to do this any time they choose.
Because it’s becoming increasingly more challenging for retailers to know with any certainty which route their customers are going to take in order to make purchases, ensuring they have the tools to cope with the level of sales and demand is of vital importance to provide the highest level of customer service and ensure customer satisfaction.
In an online world which includes social media, it only takes one defamatory tweet about the brand, product or service for businesses to end up on the news for all the wrong reasons!
Considerations for online retailers to get it right are:
- Fast loading website
- Mobile responsive website
- Exceptionally robust security
- Easy to use interface
- Fluid and secure payment gateway supporting multiple payment methods
- Up to date content and real time updates
- Post sale communication
- Integrated CRM system
Ensuring your website doesn’t go down during increased traffic is obviously of paramount importance. Which is why we have developed a Downtime Calculator so you can ensure your website is up and making sales when your website visitors expect it to be. Click this link to try out our handy tool now to discover how much you could or do lose during periods of downtime and how we can help with this.
We also have a wealth of experience in helping to ensure websites stay online during heavy traffic times such as Black Friday or Cyber Monday whilst also helping make the sales process easy and manageable through our bespoke CRM system which integrates with multiple software tools to provide you with a powerful, multi-functional sales system.
Integrating your website with an online sales and customer management system can help put you leaps ahead of the competition because the entire purchasing process for your customer is seamless from start to finish.
Adding a CRM system into your sales processing gives you a greater understanding of who your customer base is and how they are likely to purchase. You have customer data at your fingertips giving you complete control and the ability to stay one step ahead of your competitors.
You can target your marketing using the in-built reporting system to ensure you’re focusing your efforts on hot leads and active customers and not just blanket marketing. Updates are made in real time and information is accessible from anywhere and at any time, which is of course essential on such momentous occasions.
You could reward loyal customers with special offers because you know exactly who they are and why they deserve rewarding. You will not only solidify your existing relationship with that client/customer but you will also leave a lasting impression which could indeed lead to the best advertising of all, word of mouth (whether in the spoken word, via an email or on a social media platform, it’s all exceptionally relevant).
As we have reported over the last few years’, the world is rapidly moving into the digitalsphere and especially via mobile and tablets, so if you’re a business owner and not already reaping the rewards of online sales, mobile sales, apps and a CRM system then it’s time to join the madding crowd.
We’d love to help improve your bottom line so please get in touch now for a free no obligation chat about exactly how we can do that for you.