Dropping prices during the festival season is not a new concept, but can you really make money out of it? The answer is yes: discount sales during festive seasons can bring a 42% increase in profit.
So, the last thing you want to do is to miss out on a potential sale because of not having an offer that’s attractive enough or sensitive enough. If this is the case, here are some best practices on how you can run a sales discount during the festive season and increase your profits.
Let’s see how you can capture those festive shoppers who are ready to go on a spending spree.
Contents
- 1 What are the benefits of a seasonal discount sale?
- 2 Common types of discounts
- 3 Implementing a mega festive sales discount: best practices
- 4 1. Establish a clear goal
- 5 2. Analyse past seasonal trends
- 6 3. Promote your sale by building anticipation
- 7 4. Be prepared to handle the extra work
- 8 5. How to prepare your eCommerce website for a festival sale discount
- 9 6. Email marketing
- 10 7. Consider an influencer strategy
- 11 Prepare for the biggest sale ever!
What are the benefits of a seasonal discount sale?
A reduction in price or the increase in the value of a purchase from the customer’s perspective is called a sales discount. Festive seasons witness a lot of discount campaigns hosted by big and small brands alike.
Here’s why running a sales discount during the holidays is a good marketing strategy:
- Holidays are peak spending seasons and when shoppers have the most FOMO. People want to find the best deals and good products. Diwali 2021 saw an INR1.25 trillion in eCommerce sales and was at an all-time high.
- Clearing inventory: Sales discount can be a way to clear old stocks to make space for new ones.
- More profit: Festive discounts have a proven track record of bringing in more revenue. It’s also a great way to reach a new customer base. You can make use of different marketing channels to maximise results.
Common types of discounts
Before creating your discount offer, you need to know the options you have. Offering discounts depend on the type of products you sell, its profit margin, how many customers you have, and how you promote it.
Referral
Referral discounts are a good option if your goal is to bring in new customers with the help of your existing customers. How it works: offer discounts when a current customer refers a friend or promotes you on social media.
Conditional promotions
Instead of offering flat discounts, set certain limits or conditions that customers have to meet in order to qualify for the discount. This is a great option if you want to protect your margins if you’re selling a low-profit margin product. Here are some examples:
- Buy x worth of items and get % off
- Buy and get one free
Clearance sale
Do you have old inventory to clear up? Clearance sales are the best way to do that. The Diwali sales of 2021 show a spike in pre-festive sale in shopping.
Coupons and vouchers
View this post on Instagram
On your online store, customers can avail discounts by using a coupon code. You can share this via email, website, or even on product packaging. It’s the easiest way to run a sale campaign.
Bundling
Offering more than one product as a bundle and reducing its price is also a good strategy for sales discount. By increasing the average value of the purchase, customers feel they are getting more for less.
Free shipping
Shipping cost is one of the major causes of abandoned carts, which is a major revenue killer. Offering free shipping as your festive discount offer eliminates one of the last obstacles that could prevent people from completing a purchase.
Implementing a mega festive sales discount: best practices
Running a sales discount during the festival season is pretty challenging. You want to give your customers something that is different, memorable and of course profitable. Here’s how to do it right.
1. Establish a clear goal
What do you want to gain from offering sale discount? Generating quick revenue is a common goal. You could set a target for this and find ways to measure the progress or success of the campaign.
Other common goals of running a discount campaign is to build brand awareness, capture leads, and gain social media engagement.
2. Analyse past seasonal trends
When planning a festive discount campaign, you don’t have to start from scratch. There’s lots of data available on the previous years’ festive season sales. Use this data to craft your campaign. If you hosted a sale before, look into its result and see what worked and what didn’t.
Here’s what you can get from seasonal trends:
- When to start your discount campaign
- How to promote it
- Which channels bring the best results
- Website pages with more traffic (which products got more traction)
3. Promote your sale by building anticipation
In simple words, talk about your sale before it begins. Start a countdown on social media, engage with your audience, and start sending out emails.
Instead of waiting till the week of the festival, you can launch the sale before the actual event.
According to TechPanda, Diwali 2021 saw a major increase in pre-Diwali sales in September.
Create a content strategy to promote your campaign
Plan social media posts in advance and build anticipation around the seasonal sale. Capture better product images and write engaging captions.
View this post on Instagram
Here are some ideas for a content-driven approach to promoting your festival sale:
- Holiday gifting guide
- How to use your product
- Educational content
By following a content-first strategy, you will give your customers a personalised shopping experiences which is what people crave during festive seasons.
You can try different channels to promote the discount, apart from social media. Send emails to your email list or even start a newsletter. Also, if you ever wanted to try paid ads for your business, this might be a right time.
4. Be prepared to handle the extra work
Festival sale days can get busier than you expect. According to last year’s report, five days before Diwali 2021 demonstrated an increase in the buyer’s retail shopping interest. Also, 200% increase in daily sales was seen at the end of September.
As a small business owner, you might be handling all the tasks yourself. So, make sure you are prepared to handle all the extra work that comes with a seasonal mega sale. You will also need to react quickly when things don’t go as planned.
Aside from stocking up on inventory and packaging products, here are a few things you will need to put extra effort into:
- Customer service: answer DMs and reply to comments quickly to not lose out on sales
- Shipping and fulfilment: Make sure your shipping partner knows that they would have to handle more orders
- Content: Before the day/week of the sale, get all your content pieces ready for promotion
- Website: Your online store is where the sale happens. Prepare every aspect of it to run a smooth campaign
5. How to prepare your eCommerce website for a festival sale discount
Your online store should be groomed to take in the extra customers that will arrive your on your store during the festive sale. And you should be able to convert those store visitors. Here’s how to do that:
Store banner images and popups
Announce the sales discount on your online store.
Update your home page banner image with an image announcing the festive sale. On Instamojo online store, you have the option to display multiple images on the home page. You can easily edit one to announce the ongoing sale.
If you are running a discount sale with a coupon code, you can show that with a popup. You can use the popup to collect the email address of store visitors.
Product images
Did you know that 75% of online shoppers rely on product images to make a purchase decision?
Capture the best product images and make it appealing to customers. For better understanding, add multiple product images. Make sure they are properly optimised to have a better page load speed. Nobody likes a slow website, especially when holiday shopping!
Collect reviews and testimonials
In a survey we conducted, a majority of eCommerce consumers stated that they don’t purchase products that do not have any reviews.
So, if you don’t have reviews for products on your online store yet, it’s time to collect some! You don’t want festive shoppers to turn back just because they couldn’t find any reviews. So, before the festive sale starts, contact past customers and ask them to add a review.
Store analytics
Every good online store has the option to monitor analytics. This would be helpful to measure how successful your discount campaign is. If you haven’t learned how to check store analytics on your Instamojo online store dashboard, here’s a guide to get you started.
Apart from this, you can also get a new theme for your eCommerce website. Let your store match the festive mood and add a little glitz to everything!
You can get a free online store from Instamojo. Selling on an eCommerce website can actually increase your chances of getting and retaining customers. Sign up for a store today.
Here’s a detailed guide on how to prepare your business for the festive season.
6. Email marketing
Email is an untapped marketing channel by most small business brands. If you haven’t tried email marketing yet, you’re missing out on a lot. It’s a channel with the most return on investment ever, as claimed by marketers. Personalisation is a main reason behind the high success rates of email campaigns.
You can release the festive sale exclusively for your email list at first and then for others.
You can also send out start an informational email series where you give valuable tips to your target audience. For example, Ugaoo writes on Diwali-specific gardening tips in their emails during the festive season, and not just about their seasonal sale.
Start building your email list and get an email strategy ready. It doesn’t have to be an elaborate campaign. The best thing about this is you can still use your email list after festive season. Unlike other promotional channels, email lists can be leveraged anytime you want.
7. Consider an influencer strategy
If you have been contemplating on trying out influencer marketing, this might be the time to try it out.
Choose an influencer and ask them to promote your product during the festive season. Give them a special discount coupon to promote among their followers.
Here’s a guide on how to create a successful influencer marketing campaign for your business.
Prepare for the biggest sale ever!
As more eCommerce businesses are coming to the forefront, the festival season of 2022 is going to be highly competitive. But it will also see an ever-high number of online shoppers, according to recent statistics.
So brace yourself for a huge sale and make the most out of the festive shopping season.
Don’t have an online store yet to sell your products? Creaye one for free on Instamojo. This festive season, stand out with an eCommerce website, attract more customers and make more sales.
