8 Things To Do Before Black Friday
It's that time of the year again: Black Friday, and whether it's your first one or you want to surpass your sales from last Black Friday, you better make sure everything is in order before the biggest retail event of the year. In bricks and mortar stores you need to be stocked to the brim, with all hands on deck and extra security in some cases. We online sellers however don't have to fear the ravage of hungry-for-sales customers breaking our doors and running as if they were in a marathon, and since we have Shopify hosting our websites, we don't even have to worry about our stores going out of service. But we do have our homework to do, in order to run a SMOOTH Black Friday.
To help you not forget about any crucial tasks you should complete before the start of your campaign, we have prepared a quick checkup list composed of 8 things to remember before releasing your Black Friday campaign. You know you are quite busy right now so we tried to be as straight to the point as possible.
1. Have your images related to Black Friday
You can spend loads of money on advertisement but if your website doesn't look good and customised according to the campaign you are holding then you will be much more likely to have just another ordinary day right on Black Friday. Therefore, have your images, banners, bars and texts looking splendid and in the spirit of Black Friday. Different content for different days.
2. Let your subscribers know in advance of your discounts
How will you get people know of your Black Friday super deals? Email campaigns, Facebook, Google or Twitter ads? No matter what are your methods, have them working before your sales campaign starts and bare in mind that tons of other businesses will be on the market competing with you so be sure you will do the right thing to convince people to visit your store rather than any other website.
3. Make sure you have the right products assigned for your cross-sells
Among the best sources of sales, upselling and cross-selling are definitely a must for most businesses. But it is important to do the right assimilation. Don't go recommending a banana to a customer looking into buying a dress. Make sure your related products are relevant and of interest of your customer. If you are hosting your website with Shopify, best thing to do is to simply download a cross-selling app to your store. Our Shopify Agency developed the only fully automated cross-selling app available on Shopify. Go have a look at it and if you would like to learn more about it, just drop us a message at hello@smooth.ie.
4. Edit your store website's theme
A sales campaign is not only about offering discounts, you also need to prepare a cohesive campaign that's visible throughout your theme, taking every opportunity to guide your visitors to the discounts with flashy imagery on your homepage, promo notice bars and Black Friday links throughout your navigation. All this takes time to setup and it's crucial that you have the content ready and tested in advance rather than clicking the save button at the start of the promotion and hoping you didn't make a mistake. We know that it can be a hassle to prepare a whole theme for one campaign and then redo your theme after your campaign ends, though it really saves you from the stress of scrambling in the last minutes. With our app, Theme Scheduler you can setup as many campaigns as you want, choose what day and time you want it to be published and unpublished and that's it. No more working through the night to have a campaign ready by 3 am. Just schedule it with as much advance as you want.
5. Prepare your cart recovery emails
Make it clear that your customer who just abandoned a cart is not missing out on a simple offer - they are missing out on a Black Friday offer, and for this you might want to add a clear text inviting them to go back to their cart before the campaign finishes. Shopify makes it quite simple with carts being sent automatically depending on your subscription plan, though it is your responsibility to prepare the text you want to be displayed on the cart recovery email. Alternatively you can always rely on the usual suspects, MailChimp or Klaviyo.
6. Prepare your crew
Hopefully you will have a huge volume of sales, which means more work for your personnel. Have your support team ready to deal with more people doing everything from fulfilment and support to complaints and refunds.
7. Examine your stock
There is no point in running ads, going through all that preparation and not having products in stock. Make sure that everything is in order and that you have as many staff as possible working in fulfilment. It is worth checking the volume of sales from your last Black Friday campaign so you can have a solid idea of what to expect, but as a general rule of thumb you should be prepared to do six average weeks worth of sales throughout BFCM.
8. Check if discounts and vouchers are properly working
You know, it could happen that you run ads to advertise for this super discount and magic voucher and… you forget to create vouchers and discounts or for some reason they are just not working. Go check it now, buy something on sale or use the voucher you have created. If the purchase was just like you expected it to be, then you are ready to start your Black Friday. Best of luck - though preparation and planning could be better than luck!
To help you not forget about any crucial tasks you should complete before the start of your campaign, we have prepared a quick checkup list composed of 8 things to remember before releasing your Black Friday campaign. You know you are quite busy right now so we tried to be as straight to the point as possible.
1. Have your images related to Black Friday
You can spend loads of money on advertisement but if your website doesn't look good and customised according to the campaign you are holding then you will be much more likely to have just another ordinary day right on Black Friday. Therefore, have your images, banners, bars and texts looking splendid and in the spirit of Black Friday. Different content for different days.
2. Let your subscribers know in advance of your discounts
How will you get people know of your Black Friday super deals? Email campaigns, Facebook, Google or Twitter ads? No matter what are your methods, have them working before your sales campaign starts and bare in mind that tons of other businesses will be on the market competing with you so be sure you will do the right thing to convince people to visit your store rather than any other website.
3. Make sure you have the right products assigned for your cross-sells
Among the best sources of sales, upselling and cross-selling are definitely a must for most businesses. But it is important to do the right assimilation. Don't go recommending a banana to a customer looking into buying a dress. Make sure your related products are relevant and of interest of your customer. If you are hosting your website with Shopify, best thing to do is to simply download a cross-selling app to your store. Our Shopify Agency developed the only fully automated cross-selling app available on Shopify. Go have a look at it and if you would like to learn more about it, just drop us a message at hello@smooth.ie.
4. Edit your store website's theme
A sales campaign is not only about offering discounts, you also need to prepare a cohesive campaign that's visible throughout your theme, taking every opportunity to guide your visitors to the discounts with flashy imagery on your homepage, promo notice bars and Black Friday links throughout your navigation. All this takes time to setup and it's crucial that you have the content ready and tested in advance rather than clicking the save button at the start of the promotion and hoping you didn't make a mistake. We know that it can be a hassle to prepare a whole theme for one campaign and then redo your theme after your campaign ends, though it really saves you from the stress of scrambling in the last minutes. With our app, Theme Scheduler you can setup as many campaigns as you want, choose what day and time you want it to be published and unpublished and that's it. No more working through the night to have a campaign ready by 3 am. Just schedule it with as much advance as you want.
5. Prepare your cart recovery emails
Make it clear that your customer who just abandoned a cart is not missing out on a simple offer - they are missing out on a Black Friday offer, and for this you might want to add a clear text inviting them to go back to their cart before the campaign finishes. Shopify makes it quite simple with carts being sent automatically depending on your subscription plan, though it is your responsibility to prepare the text you want to be displayed on the cart recovery email. Alternatively you can always rely on the usual suspects, MailChimp or Klaviyo.
6. Prepare your crew
Hopefully you will have a huge volume of sales, which means more work for your personnel. Have your support team ready to deal with more people doing everything from fulfilment and support to complaints and refunds.
7. Examine your stock
There is no point in running ads, going through all that preparation and not having products in stock. Make sure that everything is in order and that you have as many staff as possible working in fulfilment. It is worth checking the volume of sales from your last Black Friday campaign so you can have a solid idea of what to expect, but as a general rule of thumb you should be prepared to do six average weeks worth of sales throughout BFCM.
8. Check if discounts and vouchers are properly working
You know, it could happen that you run ads to advertise for this super discount and magic voucher and… you forget to create vouchers and discounts or for some reason they are just not working. Go check it now, buy something on sale or use the voucher you have created. If the purchase was just like you expected it to be, then you are ready to start your Black Friday. Best of luck - though preparation and planning could be better than luck!
TAGS
Black Friday
Cyber Monday
Sales
Shopify