Valentine's Day The global day of romance is upon us once more but this day marks not only an important day for couples but also retailers. The whirlwind romance between Americans and Valentine's Day generated $20.1 billion U.S. dollars in 2018 with one in four Americans buying their gifts online. That's a whole lot of chocolate and roses. As a business with an online store how can you get a piece of that heart shape pie? But first things first what type of industries can cash in on this occasion? Well nearly all of them. A study by Statista revealed the most popular gift types last year.
As consumers get more and more digitally savvy consumers are once again turning to the web for the week leading up to Valentines Day. And this love affair isn't only happening on desktops as mobile accounted for a staggering 24% of sales last year and customers expected to spend on average 30% more online! So what does this mean for retailers? It means there is no denying it would be a big mistake if you don't have a few brilliant Valentine's Day marketing ideas in hand to take advantage of this season. In this post we are going to take you through 4 specific proven-effective and easy to execute ideas to generate some skyrocket conversions.
An obvious one for brick and mortar store owners but how about your online storefront? Create an eye-catching design by creating a welcome coupon pop-up a banner on a homepage slides or one of our favourites a themed gift guide. We saw the approach Walmart took on their website and had to share it. Creating themed gift guides reduces the stress of the holiday for your customers. You can target them towards lifestyle for example the athlete bookworm etc. or play to the relationship type Valentine's day gifts for her him teachers dog. To help consumers fall even more in love with your gift guides consider applying filters to each list:
Showcasing your products to potential customers in multiple ways encourages them to think of all of the special people in their lives that might enjoy a Valentine's Day treat. Follow through on this by supplementing that effort with marketing content for your email list social media and website. Giving your customers the easiest path to purchase is essential to ensuring conversions.
Did you know that 74% of online shoppers are expected to buy their gifts off Amazon? Today it's not a question of should you be selling on Amazon but how. You can check out our eBook on the '8 Clever Ways To Win On The Amazon Marketplace' for more on this. Making sure you are using online marketplaces to sell your products and services is essential to ensuring you can expand and grow your audience. We put together a blog on the 7 best ways to improve your online marketplace strategy which includes:
And by selling your products through marketplaces like Amazon not only does it give your consumers the option to purchase through their preferred retailer (meaning you don't miss out on a sale) but it also allows you to strengthen retailer partnerships. Using technology such as 'Where to Buy' technology ensures your marketing efforts are not going to waste as you get access to real-time marketing and sales performance insights - reducing the reliance on third-party retailers to provide sales data.
Now that you have your storefront set up and ready to go. It's time to send out your campaigns that put shoppers on the easiest path to purchase. By directing your email traffic to relevant pages you should see an increase in both sales and conversions! Here are 5 ways to roll up your sleeves and start building your Valentines email campaign.
We love this email campaign that 'Uncommon Goods' sent out with the "view this email in browser" line. They customized it for Valentine's Day with "Email's broken-hearted? View in a browser." Which was a surefire way to increase their open rates!
There are endless possibilities to create fun campaigns on social media to drive people to your website. Generate some user-generated content by setting up polls and adding suitable hashtags to your content to gain the likelihood of people seeing. How else can your e-commerce store leverage the power of social media to drive online Valentine's Day sales?
Contests can be a powerful tool for building both brand awareness and engagement plus they can always aid in creating user-generated content. What's not to like? Check out this Valentine giveaway that Dunkin Donuts carried out on Instagram. They created (yet another) great user-generated content campaign which encouraged their customers to compete in a "Dublin' Love" Instagram contest which was also streamed on Facebook live and had Snapchat Geofilters at certain Dunkin' Donuts locations. This allowed customers to show their creative side while also showing off their themed donuts win-win. Many eCommerce professionals' find that they can uncover new leads by offering giveaways. Just make sure you check the lottery laws in your state or country to make sure you follow the rules.
Don't worry we're not asking you to marry us but we are asking you to reach out to learn how our team and technology can help you convert these consumers this Valentine's day. Book a demo today to find out more about how we have helped brands see a 20% increase in conversion rate and a 30% average basket size increase.
