Whether it’s Black Friday, 11.11 Singles’ Day, or Christmas, a mega sale is the golden opportunity for businesses looking to maximize their sales. But the big question is, are you pulling off the events with the right sales strategy plan?
While the pandemic has made online shopping a norm, there are still throngs of customers waiting and seeking the best deals during these events.
You’ll need the right strategies before the events arrive to make the most out of it, so don’t get engrossed by the prospect of big sales numbers just yet! Get a good sales strategy plan going for your mega sale with our tips here below.
1. Build up presale hype
Aside from the usual promotional social media posts as part of your sales strategy plan, one way to get your customers’ interest is to run a pre-launch reach campaign. Run paid ads to build exposure for your mega sale at the same time to attract new potential customers who’re looking for similar products.
Moreover, you shouldn’t miss out on getting your existing customers in on the hype either! Send them email newsletters or messages to inform them of upcoming new deals or offers. After all, they are the ones who are more likely (14 times higher) to spend again on your products.
If you’re short on ideas, consider doing a teaser campaign as it works wonders in hooking people into your sale.
This is also the time where you collect all the essential information through paid ads and website traffic; this includes info of who’s ready to buy and a general forecast of hot-selling products. You can then retarget the potential customers during the mega sale day with the products they were browsing for.
2. Promote during the sales day
Promoting during the sale itself should be a core part of any sales strategy plan as many people hunt for the best deals during sale times or seasons.
For this reason, it’s a good idea to run a conversions campaign on the day of your mega sale, such as on Facebook with Instant Experience ad format. These campaigns focus on converting, a.k.a. getting potential customers to actually buy at your mega sale. But do keep in mind that mega sale seasons usually mean higher CPCs (cost-per-click) as all the brands are competing on the digital space to capitalize on the sale season.
Plus, don’t forget about advertising as it also lets you collect valuable customer information through clicks, enquiries, website visits, etc., which is great for helping you upsell or retarget your customers in the future.
On the content side of things, you should make sure any advertising campaign you run is up to snuff by creating compelling ad copies and graphics that are relevant to the special occasion.
3. Get personalized and engaging
Ever since the pandemic and lockdown, customers are craving connections and entertainment in their shopping experience. By offering joy, increasing engagement, and building online communities as part of your mega sales strategy plan, you’ll be closing a lot more sales than you would have via the traditional way.
Take conversational commerce for instance. Shifting buyer behaviors now mean that consumers are more likely to buy from businesses that they can talk to for exploring offerings, getting help, and so on. Thus, adding live support, chatbots, and AI assistants can go a long way in sprucing up your customers’ shopping experience.
Other than that, livestream shopping has also redefined the way customers shop. It allows business owners or partnering influencers to showcase and demonstrate their offerings as well as answer questions in real-time, making it a lot more interactive as you can connect directly with your customers.
You can also take your sales strategy plan a step further by utilizing influencer marketing. By giving the influencer in your niche an active role and allowing an authentic voice to promote your products, they can help to build trust among followers for your brand.
Shoppers are open to new product discoveries while taking part in entertaining shopping experiences now. Every moment in the digital space can be an opportunity for product discovery.
4. Create a captivating product page
A good offer is only half the equation as your product page needs to capture their interest enough and guide them to commit to a purchase or more. To create a product page design that stands out, you should create custom banners, visuals, copies, and landing pages that include all items on sales, which can be tailored to different occasions.
Besides a proper design, a captivating product page should also be authentic. Look to include any testimonials and reviews by customers as well to support your customers’ buying decisions.
One tip worth remembering while executing your mega sales strategy plan is that consumers are prepared to spend during mega sales. This means you can further maximize your business sales by subtly encouraging them to buy more, so consider adding these subtle hints below on your page for an indirect prompt:
- Product suggestion
- Bundle deals
- Spend-and-save offers
- Free shipping and gifts for spending a certain amount
Remember, within the first few seconds as customers check out your product page, this page can mean the difference between a sale closed and a lost customer so make sure they land on a good one.
5. Ensure a fulfilling buying experience for the customer
Consumers just want to buy what they want quickly. A less-than-desirable buying experience will only hurt your chances of closing the sale, no matter how good your sales strategy plan is.
Having a mobile-friendly shopping channel is very important as many consumers shop on mobile devices nowadays. Your mega sale shouldn’t just be designed with a computer in mind; any and every design, visual, text, video, and marketing material you have should all appear just as clearly and properly on a smartphone or tablet.
There’s also the matter of payment options too. While credit cards and online banking are obvious choices, they shouldn’t be the only payment methods as not everybody has them. As such, consider implementing other payment methods like e-wallets, mobile payment apps, installment options, or even cash on delivery. The more payment options you accept, the more everyone gets to make a purchase.
At the end of the day, if you can promise everyone a smooth, seamless, and enjoyable buying process as part of your mega sales strategy plan, you’re on your way to closing more sales.
6. Provide good customer service & communication
Consumers are more contemplative now as many seek to connect with businesses to get more info on products or services. Most shoppers do their research before committing to purchase these days, hence effective communication in your mega sales strategy plan is essential.
As customers surge during mega sales, it’s ideal to have a dedicated customer service team on hand to handle any questions and enquiries that come in. If having more staff on hand isn’t an option, creating an FAQ list or implementing chatbots with automated answers is also a viable alternative. The idea here is to make sure people can get an instant response to their questions.
Also, strive to stay upfront and responsive in addressing any courier delays or cases of backorders. You should keep customers updated and show that you are actively following up on solving these issues. Customers appreciate transparency and honesty, so give them that.
If anything, don’t undervalue the importance of good customer service and communication in your sales strategy plan – they’re crucial for helping clear a customer’s feelings of objection and doubt. With quality customer service, your customers will be more inclined to make a purchase, give a satisfactory review, and repeat orders without forethought.
7. Ensure good website reliability and stability
All that extra traffic from mega sales can cause slow loading times or even crashes if your platform can’t cope with the crowd.
If your business runs its own e-commerce website, it would be wise to optimize it for increased speed and loading times to ensure no customer experience gets bogged down. It’s not necessarily a monumental task – compressing images and removing unwanted pages, coding, and scripts are just some ways you can start helping your pages load faster.
But to truly ensure your website is able to bear the increased traffic load, it’s a good idea to run some stress tests a couple of weeks ahead of the sale. This will let you know your website’s limits and whether an upgrade is needed for your mega sales strategy plan.
While you’re at it, you will also want to ensure your website’s tools and features are working properly, which includes functions for entering discount codes, checkout, and any other buttons. You don’t want customers bailing out on your sale just because the promo codes are not working!
Conclusion / Final thoughts
At the end of the day, mega sales can most certainly deliver some promising sales numbers, but that’s only if you have the right sales strategy plan to capitalize on its potential!
Nevertheless, it’s worth remembering that not all your marketing efforts should be directed to just your mega sales, though! Customers are making purchases anytime nowadays when they need something, which means having a good all-time strategy like an always-on campaign that can bring in customers reliably is just as vital for your business’s long-term success.
At Artisense, we help SMBs and SME businesses like you to brainstorm and work out successful sales campaigns through comprehensive mega sales strategy plans across different online channels, be it Facebook, Instagram, Google, or YouTube. Get in touch with us if you need a result-driven sales strategy plan today!
