Black Friday Cyber Monday (BFCM) is the most profitable season for eCommerce merchants…and the worst time to experience data loss.
That’s why we’re sharing a series of valuable tips from our eCommerce agency partners to help merchants protect their online stores this holiday season! Within each blog, you’ll find valuable tips and tricks to help you and other eCommerce merchants prepare for the most popular shopping weekend of the year—a prime opportunity to boost your organization’s revenue, brand awareness, customer base, and more.
In this installment of our Q&A series, we sat down with Ellie Scotland. She’s a Senior Account Strategist at eHouse Studio, an end-to-end eCommerce and Shopify Plus agency. eHouse Studio is dedicated to building and optimizing eCommerce sites that shoppers love, and implementing retention tactics that keep them coming back. A long-standing Rewind partner, eHouse Studio has grown rapidly this year, acquiring two of Rewind’s other partners, VL OMNI and Pointer.
Read on for Ellie’s insights!
What are your top tips for eCommerce merchants who are preparing for BFCM?
- Don’t keep your sales a mystery: Let people know what items are going on sale, what the discounts will look like, and when they can snag those deals. Your customers love to plan ahead, and with so many brands competing for their attention, you want to make sure you’re on their radar early.
- Create a specific BFCM landing page: This is an opportunity to curate a unique shopping experience. Put together themed collections or highlight gift ideas, which could be especially helpful for people doing their holiday shopping. You could even launch the page early, so customers can plan their purchases before the sale officially starts. Strategies like this help build anticipation (and for the more visual learners, so might a countdown clock component!).
- Optimize your site navigation: Highlight your BFCM promotions with banners and blocks that aren’t just on your homepage, but on your collection pages, too. Make it super easy for shoppers to find your deals, whether through clear menu links or bold promo blocks that lead straight to your BFCM landing page.
- Partner with influencers: Get your best-selling products into their hands early. They can start generating buzz by showcasing your products, sharing authentic reviews, and driving awareness around your upcoming sale. Encouraging them to share your BFCM landing page link will help build anticipation and direct their followers straight to your deals when promotions go live. It’s an effective way to amplify your reach and get your brand in front of new audiences before the big event.
How can merchants maximize their email marketing efforts during BFCM and the holiday season?
Before heading into this high-traffic sales period, it’s crucial to scrub your email lists to improve open rates and engagement. Ensure your segments are updated and personalized based on customer behavior and preferences. By tailoring your offers to what each group cares about, you will significantly boost the likelihood of securing clicks and conversions. It’s all about delivering the right message to the right people, at the right time.
Link your email opt-in page across all your social media platforms and market it as a way for customers to get the “VIP treatment.” Let them know that subscribers will receive early access to your BFCM sales, helping them plan their purchases ahead of time. This approach not only grows your mailing list but makes customers feel special, prioritized, and pumped for the holiday!
When it comes to your email design, now is the time to ensure it really stands out. Stunning visuals, bold CTAs, and catchy subject lines are essential. You can even include an animated countdown timer to create urgency for your sale. Use this space to showcase your new BFCM landing page, driving customers directly to your promotions. This is your chance to make a strong impact and capture valuable consumer attention.
Why is it important to implement a strong backup and recovery strategy ahead of BFCM?
Websites often see a significant increase in traffic and sales during BFCM—Shopify merchants experienced a whopping 24% YoY increase in sales during BFCM 2023! Although Shopify manages most of the technical infrastructure of your store, there’s still a chance of system crashes or outages from unexpected traffic spikes. A backup and recovery plan ensures data is secure and can be quickly restored if an issue arises.
Additionally, during BFCM season, multiple team members often make rapid changes to products, promotions, pricing, and inventory. This faster pace increases the risk of human error, such as accidentally deleting or overwriting important data. Mistakes happen, especially during manual site updates. Having a comprehensive backup strategy ensures your business is set up for success during BFCM and beyond.
A seamless user experience is crucial during BFCM, as customers expect a fast, error-free shopping experience. If issues arise, a robust backup and recovery plan helps ensure that disruptions are minimal, protecting the customer experience and maintaining your brand reputation.
Has your agency seen merchants experience data loss? If so, what happened and how long did it take to recover the data?
Absolutely! As much as Shopify does an excellent job at keeping a version history for various parts of the Shopify platform, your individual store data does not benefit from this functionality. We have seen first-hand that experienced merchants often accidentally delete products and collections, overwrite inventory levels, or delete important versions of their theme. Unfortunately, these items needed to be recreated manually and there was no way to recover them from Shopify—that is, not without a backup plan.
Prepare your online store for BFCM
Leading up to BFCM, you have enough to worry about—don’t let data backups be an added stress on your to-do list.
Rewind’s automated daily backups help protect what matters to you, from a single email campaign to an entire store. Whether it’s a third-party app error, malicious attack, or an innocent mistake, you’ll have peace of mind knowing that you can recover your data in minutes.
There’s more BFCM content where this came from!
Looking for additional exclusive eCommerce insights?
Don’t miss more BFCM tips from our partner Mike Riess at Riess Group! Plus: learn more about how data backups can be your secret weapon this BFCM and tips for standing out online during BFCM 2024.
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