5 Costly Mistakes that Put the Scrooge in Your Online Holiday Sales - by WhatDoISell.com

5 Costly Mistakes that Put the Scrooge in Your Online Holiday Sales - By Lisa Suttora, Founder & CEO of WhatDoISell.com

Selling online this holiday season?

If so, then you don’t want to fall into these 5 common traps that many online sellers make… (they’ll put the “Scrooge” in your online sales.)
1. Not preparing your website/online store to look like Christmas.

Imagine what your local mall would feel like during the holiday season WITHOUT all those holiday bells and whistles.

It certainly wouldn’t get you in the holiday spirit would it?

Yet frequently, online sellers do nothing to prepare their stores with a holiday look & feel. If you want potential holiday shoppers to stop and shop on your website, you need to let them know that you are dialed-in and ready for the holiday season.

This doesn’t have to cost an arm & a leg either – there are things you can do to bring the spirit of the season (and the sales) to your website for less than the cost of a dinner out. I talk about several ways to do this in my 2009 Holiday Season Checklist audio training.

2. Merchandising too late.

You cannot, I repeat CANNOT wait until December to start featuring your holiday merchandise.

Otherwise it will simply be TOO late in the season to pick up anything but last minute sales.

3. If you sell on eBay, in order to get the best visibility for your products you need to mix up your listing formats.

If you’ve been selling everything in a Fixed Price Multi-Quantity Format, it’s time to relist or list some new merchandise in a 7 day fixed price format.

4. Not collecting email addresses of your customers.

This is probably one of the most business devastating mistakes I see people make during the holidays.

I recently worked with a client who sold almost 800 items last year during the months of Sept – Dec. and hadn’t tracked any of those customer’s email addresses. That’s 800 people who they never followed up with again!

Now there are certain legalities that you need to be aware of in order to do this so that you’ll be in compliance with the CAN SPAM email laws – but when done correctly, a simple year-end email can build an ongoing relationship with your customers for the following year.

5. Telling your customers what you can’t/won’t do instead of what you CAN do. Nobody likes to be told “We don’t do this or No, you can’t have that.”
Well the same goes for your holiday customers. It’s all in how you say it.

• “We don’t accept checks.” should be “We accept Visa, Mastercard, Discover & PayPal


• “We can’t ship overnight.” can be rephrased as “We’re delighted to offer two day shipping.”

Look at your website, eBay store or listings. Count the # of times your copy says “We can’t” or “We don’t” then replace those statements with “We can” and “We’ll gladly.”

It takes 43 muscles to frown and only 17 to smile. The same goes for your holiday web copy – make it smile!

Your customers will thank you by rewarding you with their business!

About the author: Lisa Suttora is an ecommerce expert, noted product trend authority and the Founder & CEO of eBay Certified Provider WhatDoISell.com. With 15 years of online & offline retail merchandising experience, Lisa brings a fresh approach to the topic of "what to sell and how to sell it."

Since 2004, WhatDoISell.com has provided thousands of online sellers with the skills, knowledge and support they need to build a unique, thriving business on eBay.