Make More Money in the Coming Holiday Season

Posted by Alan Liew

Is your e-business ready for the holiday shopping season? It’d better be as the online holiday shopping season begins the day after Halloween.

Holiday web sales keep growing every year as more and shoppers go online. Online retailers that don’t get ready for the holidays can expect to loose lots of holiday web sales to their competitors.

Preparing for the holiday rush isn’t hard. You know it’s near and its time to start preparations. Even if you start preparing in October or November you can still get ready in time to get your piece of the holiday web sales. The peak of the holiday shopping spree online is between December 5 and 10.

The first step you need to take to get ready for holiday web sales is the most basic: get your website ready for the holidays. Just as brick and mortar stores decorate for the holidays, you should decorate your site with Christmas themed graphics like Santa Claus and Christmas trees. Remember it’s the holidays so remind your customers that the holidays are coming because they’ll need to buy gifts.

Do more than decorate for the holidays; offer your customers something special for the holidays to generate holiday web sales. Hold a sale or spotlight a special product that you only make available for the holidays. To drive holiday web sales consider adding products to your line just for the holidays. Take advantage of the power of bundling by combining some of your products into gift sets.

You can also help your customers decide what gifts to buy with the power of suggestion. Adding a list of great gift ideas with links to products in your inventory to your web site is a great way to drive holiday web sales. Organizing the list into categories like “gifts under $20,” “stocking stuffers” and “gifts for mom” can give people ideas of what to buy.

Generate holiday web sales without adding inventory or shipping expenses by offering gift cards and gift certificates. Gift certificates and cards are a great income stream you get paid even though you don’t have to deliver a product or deal with holiday shipping. Anybody who gets one of your gift certificates or cards is a potential new customer. Gift certificates and cards are great advertising because people receive them from somebody that they already know and trust.

Don’t forget to remind your customers about shipping during the holiday season. Go to the websites of the main shippers such as US Postal Service, UPS, and FedEx and get their holiday shipping schedules. Then post the schedules on your website to remind your visitors that the deadlines for shipping packages to arrive in time for Christmas are approaching. This can drive holiday web sales by creating a sense of urgency, by reminding your customers they have a limited time to place their orders.

Is This Common Mistake Holding You From Making Money?

Posted by Alan Liew | 10:14 AM

4 comments

Guest Post by PV Reymond

I always ask my students: “What is your target market?” And many times I receive the answer:

“My target market is everybody.”

Then, I have to explain to them how that approach will make them fail and the importance of targeting a small niche. For this reason I want to share with you this article, so that you don’t make that same mistake.

Your product needs to be special. It has to fit the needs of a specific group. Narrow down your potential market or it will become too much. Consider it: you sell glue. OK, what kind? What is it for? Who needs it? Why?



The possibilities are endless. Unless your plan is to establish a huge corporation and you have the funds to put it together, with hundreds of products, you need to find a niche, a spot where you can attract the right customers for your particular item.

Narrowing down your potential customers means you can spend more time focusing on them. A smaller focus allows you to do as well as, or better than, those large corporations. Good profits can come from concentrating on a specific group that can use your product for a special project or need.

Let’s say that you want to go into the weight loss market, as you know it is a very profitable market but with a huge competition so, it is difficult to compete with large companies because they have huge budgets.

But if you narrow it down you have more chances to stand out from your competitors and make good profit. In this case you can target weight loss after pregnancy or weight loss for women between 45 and 60, etc.

The same with the Internet Marketing market, let’s say you want to go with traffic where you’ll find lot of competitors. But if you go deeper everything becomes easier, you can go with traffic using social media or go even deeper, traffic using facebook. The more you narrow it down the better.

In order to narrow down your niche you have to explore the market place and know what it needs. Now, consider the results of the market survey you had done and the areas where your competitors are already doing well. Use a table or a graph to show where there might be an opening for your product or service.

One hard step that needs to be taken is finding the right combination of product, service, quality, and price. Customers need to feel you will give them a better deal and meet their needs. Sadly, there’s no proven effective path to follow to find the right combination. You just have to compare things and see what works best.

Your database should be put together with care, as it can help you sort through the market information and show particular segments that could be overlooked. Which age groups tend to buy your product? What other items purchased? You could find additional products your buyers may be interested in.

Where should you start? Passion is a good starting point, because if the work is focused on something you love, you try harder. With a product you really like, you’ll be more willing to do the hard work to get it promoted and refine your skills.

Look into what you like and see if you can make it profitable. Will people want it? Will they look online for places to get it from? Whatever you decide to sell, there has to be a demand. Lots of places can be checked for this information - Blogs, forums and affiliate networks, social media sites, etc.

I would like to hear your feedback about this.

Author Bio
I would like to invite you to claim the free special report: 'The Hidden Truth About Making Money Online' when you visit my site: StartUp Internet Business.