Commerce Data: Your most valuable competitive advantage for holiday
Posted: Mon Feb 17, 2025 10:17 am
As you know, the holiday season, including BFCM, is critical for most merchants, accounting for 19% of total annual retail sales, on average. Use your data to shed light on your most pressing holiday challenges, including identifying the right product mix, having the right inventory levels, boosting profitability, and optimizing your marketing spend.
Forecast your targets
You have to know where you’ve been to know where you’re going. Review sales data from last year as well as past years to forecast target revenue for this year’s eCommerce holiday season. Also, identify the different levers you can pull to set higher revenue goals this year, such as driving more traffic, increasing conversions, and boosting AOV via new promotions or marketing channels.
Determine product mix and inventory
Which products will you promote this year? It’s not only important to understand what your most popular products were from last year’s holiday season but what your most profitable products were. Additionally, volume matters: once you identify your top, mid-tier, and low volume products, you can estimate how much inventory you’ll need to have on hand so that you don’t run out. Everyone hates ordering a gift for December that they discover won’t arrive until the end of January.
Plan your marketing
Look back at last year’s holiday marketing budget and return on ad spend (ROAS). Also determine which promotions were most successful and which channels (e.g., social, search, email) drove the most holiday traffic and conversions for your business last year. If you forecast how much traffic you need to drive to hit this year’s holiday revenue goals, you can estimate how much you have to spend per customer and on which channels.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, with more limited in-person social contact, last year gcash databasesaw an increase in using social media platforms for product recommendations and shopping. Nearly 8 in 10 consumers said they used at least one Facebook app or service to find gifts, and it was estimated that social commerce accounted for 11% (or $474 billion) of total global retail eCommerce revenue in 2020. This will likely occur again this year, so be prepared. Last year’s data can help you determine which social channels were most effective for you
As always, SEO should be a huge factor in your holiday marketing. Last year, search accounted for 45% of visits and revenue during the holidays, with paid search being slightly more effective than organic search. Look back to see which search terms resulted in the highest conversion rates at the best CPAs. Also factor in which terms are trending this year.
Importantly: don’t forget your existing customers. They can be very profitable, relatively low-hanging fruit for your holiday marketing efforts. The holiday season also can be a great opportunity to grow the customer relationship by providing value. Show them the love! Use behavioral and contextual customer data to personalize emails by surfacing relevant products, making recommendations, and providing special VIP offers to inspire them to shop. Promotional emails continue to show high conversion rates—a 111% increase in 2020 over 2019—for online shopping.
Forecast your targets
You have to know where you’ve been to know where you’re going. Review sales data from last year as well as past years to forecast target revenue for this year’s eCommerce holiday season. Also, identify the different levers you can pull to set higher revenue goals this year, such as driving more traffic, increasing conversions, and boosting AOV via new promotions or marketing channels.
Determine product mix and inventory
Which products will you promote this year? It’s not only important to understand what your most popular products were from last year’s holiday season but what your most profitable products were. Additionally, volume matters: once you identify your top, mid-tier, and low volume products, you can estimate how much inventory you’ll need to have on hand so that you don’t run out. Everyone hates ordering a gift for December that they discover won’t arrive until the end of January.
Plan your marketing
Look back at last year’s holiday marketing budget and return on ad spend (ROAS). Also determine which promotions were most successful and which channels (e.g., social, search, email) drove the most holiday traffic and conversions for your business last year. If you forecast how much traffic you need to drive to hit this year’s holiday revenue goals, you can estimate how much you have to spend per customer and on which channels.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, with more limited in-person social contact, last year gcash databasesaw an increase in using social media platforms for product recommendations and shopping. Nearly 8 in 10 consumers said they used at least one Facebook app or service to find gifts, and it was estimated that social commerce accounted for 11% (or $474 billion) of total global retail eCommerce revenue in 2020. This will likely occur again this year, so be prepared. Last year’s data can help you determine which social channels were most effective for you
As always, SEO should be a huge factor in your holiday marketing. Last year, search accounted for 45% of visits and revenue during the holidays, with paid search being slightly more effective than organic search. Look back to see which search terms resulted in the highest conversion rates at the best CPAs. Also factor in which terms are trending this year.
Importantly: don’t forget your existing customers. They can be very profitable, relatively low-hanging fruit for your holiday marketing efforts. The holiday season also can be a great opportunity to grow the customer relationship by providing value. Show them the love! Use behavioral and contextual customer data to personalize emails by surfacing relevant products, making recommendations, and providing special VIP offers to inspire them to shop. Promotional emails continue to show high conversion rates—a 111% increase in 2020 over 2019—for online shopping.