The 12 Posts of Christmas (or more broadly, the Holiday Shopping Season): Post One—Get your shopping season started early

In this series of posts, we will provide some short tips and thoughts for pumping up your holiday sales. You can also refer to our general overview of the holidays in the Here Comes Cyber Monday post.

Why would anyone want to start their holiday shopping early? If you can answer that question correctly, you can effectively target the type of shoppers that shop online and start early. So what is the answer? I can think of a few (you may add others):

• Convenience—Shopping online does not involve hauling yourself down to the mall, battling thousands of other shoppers for a parking spot, and navigating crowded aisles only to find the last Tickle Me Elmo® is gone. Instead, shoppers can browse and comparison shop in the comfort of their pajamas at a time that is right for them.
• Peace of mind—The holidays are busy enough. If you can help a buyer cross off some or all of their shopping list in one stop, you have done them a major service.
• Price—After finding a spot in the mall, who wants to drive to the next mall to see if you can save a few dollars? It’s not worth it but with so many gifts to buy, even the most “spendy” shoppers want to make sure they are getting a good deal.

So how do you speak to these points? Again, I have some ideas, but you can likely think of others:

• Emphasize convenience: Add content to your home page, header, or other global regions of your store design that speak to the convenience of buying online such as “Start crossing items off your holiday list today”, or “Deck the halls, and avoid the malls”.
• Emphasize hassle-free shopping: Add content on your product pages that emphasize low-cost shipping available when they order early. Include links to your shipping policies and return policies so shoppers know that ordering from your store is trustworthy. Show availability of items so buyers know an item is in stock before ordering. If an item is likely to run out before the holidays, you can include a message emphasizing the urgency of ordering early.
• Emphasize price: This is one area where you may not wish to compete depending on your products. If you offer value added services such as faster shipping or lower cost shipping, or easy returns, you may be able to emphasize those and not have to compete on price alone. However, if you can source products at a lower price than other merchants and you wish to pass along the savings, then emphasize this message to buyers. Do you offer to match prices? Do you offer a low-price guarantee? If so, make sure your buyers know. Ideally you want a comparison shopper to stop comparing sites, and choose to buy from you.

If you are leery of changing the look of your store too early (like a neighbor that put out their plastic lawn reindeer before Thanksgiving) start with just changing text. You can then make more gradual changes to the visual design of your store closer to the holidays.

Up next—customizing your header for the holidays.

Happy Sales,

Paul Boisvert
Yahoo! Small Business

Tickle Me Elmo™ is a trademark of Fischer-Price® Toys.

New Feature: IP Address included in Real-time Post and XML

As a store owner, you are probably unfortunately familiar with receiving fraudulent orders. Yahoo! Store provides a few tools to warn you when orders are suspect. Address Verification (AVS) checks to make sure that the billing address provided in the order matches that of the credit card. CVV2 (the 3-digit number on the back of a VISA and MasterCard credit card) checks to validate if that 3-digit (or sometimes four-digit) number is correct. Both of these types of fraud checking will help you catch potential fraudulent orders.

There is another type of fraud checking that is also available with your Yahoo! Store, the IP Address Blocker. Every order has a unique IP address that indicates the Internet address from which the order in your store was placed. As you review your fraudulent orders, you may notice that many of these share the same IP address or range of IP addresses. Many fraudsters will try ordering with different stolen credit card numbers in order to determine which ones will authorize a charge.

Blocking IP addresses is as simple as adding the IP Address or range of IP addresses to the IP Blocking tool. Even easier, when viewing an order in Order Manager, you can click on the IP Address which directs the IP address and you to the IP Blocking tool. From there, you can flag that IP Address as blocked.

Blocking IP addresses will result in the customer (user) not being able to place an order. They will still be able to look at your product and catalog pages, however they will experience technical difficulties when trying to access the checkout pages and thus will not be able to place an order.

Recently, Yahoo! has made an improvement to the IP Blocking tool that will allow you to evaluate IP Addresses offline. You can download orders in XML format from the Order Manager, which now includes the IP Addresses of orders. Merchants that have order processing applications outside of Yahoo! now can get the IP Address sent to them in real time through our Real-time Order Delivery integration. From there, the merchant can evaluate the orders with IP Addresses and generate a list or range of IP Addresses that should be flagged or blocked.

Randy Yim
Yahoo! Small Business

Advanced Yahoo! Store Training: Database Management 11/08/06

Solid Cactus Online Webinar

Date: November 8, 2006, 3pm EST
Location: Online
Registration Fee:FREE
Description: Managing items in your store can be a daunting task, but through the use of file uploads and the built-in Catalog Manager, that task can be made easier. In this webinar, we’ll walk you through the creation of a csv file that contains product information that you can upload to your store to add or change items. You’ll also learn how to activate and use the built-in Catalog Manager to manage items in your store.

For more information or to register, please see the Solid Cactus Events website.

Here Comes Cyber Monday…

Cyber Monday, the first Monday after Thanksgiving, is just a few short weeks away. This is the day online holiday shopping begins. Are you ready?

For most e-commerce merchants, holiday planning should be in full swing by now. What does this mean? Well, there is plenty to think about. I hope the information below helps you prepare for the holidays and most importantly, for success.

Inventory
Review your best sellers over the past year and make a plan to drive merchandising for those products for the upcoming holiday season. Most importantly, make sure you have enough stock on hand to get you through the holiday season. One of the easiest ways to upset a customer (new or old!) is to take an order for an item that is out of stock during the holidays. Remember, your customers are relying on you to deliver that perfect gift for Grandma… don’t let them down.

Pay-Per-Click Marketing
Do you change your ads for the seasons? The holidays are a great opportunity to adjust your ad headlines to capture the attention of holiday browsers, planting ideas in their mind and making them buyers.

For example, “Wide Selection of Men’s Watches” may work well for you as a general ad. As you enter the holiday season, consider changing this headline to “Watches Make Great Holiday Gifts”. As you approach the days before Christmas for example, change the ad again to play on buyer’s emotions. Use something like “Watches Make Great Last Minute Gifts for Dad” or “Choose Bestseller Watches for Last Minute Gifts for Dad”.

Be sure to include special messaging in your ad headlines. If you are offering special promotions, free shipping, or even in-store pick-up, be sure to mention it. Especially for those last minute shoppers, mentioning “Still Shipping” or “Shipping through Christmas Eve” in the ad will grab attention as well. Online shopping is all about the convenience of avoiding the holiday crowds. Be sure to stress how ordering from your store provides that convenience and avoids all the hassles. Get creative and reap the rewards!

Finally, be sure to review your references (in your Store Manager) and dig in to the referral sources for the most common keywords. Create marketing plans around the most popular keywords that browsers used to find you online. This will create greater opportunity for shoppers to find you when starting their online shopping experience through a search engine.

Holiday Promotions

Now is the time to prepare for holiday promotions. One of the most successful promotions run during the holiday season is the “free shipping” offer. By “free shipping”, I mean free shipping, no restrictions, no conditions.

If this is too risky for you, consider offering “free shipping with conditions” such as “free shipping for all purchases over $50”. Also consider a “free shipping upgrade”. If the buyer pays for Ground, upgrade it to 3-Day at no additional charge. If they pay for 2-Day, upgrade it to Overnight at no additional charge. You get the idea. Again, be creative. All of these options can be implemented in a variety of ways within the Shipping Manager section of your Store Manager.

Another good promotion is the “free gift with purchase”. Pick something small but meaningful out of your inventory. Maybe you are overstocked on an item? Put a bin of that particular item next to the shipping station and have your shippers drop one in every box for the duration of the sale. This is a great opportunity to get personal with your customer by dropping in a card with the gift that says “Happy Holidays… Thanks for Shopping with us!”.

Site Features – Utilize Sections

Turn holiday browsers into buyers. If you advertise using the word “Gift” in your description, then direct that ad to a new section called “Holiday Gifts”. Consider arranging this section by price categories, such as “Under $25”, “$25-$50”, etc. In addition, consider creating new sections such as “Best Sellers” or “Clearance Sale” or “Holiday Sale”. Again, focus your content on the season, not just in your advertising, but on your site as well.

E-Mail Marketing

Plan your strategy now. Look at last minute buyers from last season and target them again for the “Procrastinator’s Promotion”. Even think about direct mail for these people too. Don’t forget about those early shoppers either! There is a lot of opportunity with any buyer from October through mid-December. Maybe they weren’t buying a holiday gift last year, but offer them an “early bird promotion” they cannot refuse. If you have not considered e-mail marketing in the past, now might be a good time to give it a try. It is one of the most successful marketing tactics during the holiday season. Consider Campaigner by Got, integrated with your Yahoo! Merchant Solutions account. You can find the “Email Marketing” link under the Promote section in your Store Manager.

The Big Days

All of your holiday planning and strategy should center around 3 big days. Key holiday season days include Thanksgiving Day, Cyber Monday (the first Monday after Thanksgiving), Christmas Day and New Year’s Day. Each day has it’s own relative peak for online sales.

One more thing… don’t let “crazy” ideas hold you back. If you want to do something on your Yahoo! Store and you don’t know how to do it yourself, we have an incredible network of developers dedicated to helping you succeed through enhancements to your site. From the simply simple to the most complex add-on you think you can imagine, tap into the experience of an expert Yahoo! Store developer today.

Michael Ober
Yahoo! Small Business