Between Black Friday and Cyber Monday, the last weekend of November is a crazy time for small business owners. To make things easier on you, here’s a list of 5 effective Cyber Monday tips you can use to grow your business.
Keep reading to learn how to make this Cyber Monday your best one yet!
Grow your business with these 5 Cyber Monday tips
1. Start your planning early
To make this Cyber Monday a success, it’s important that you proactively prepare for it.
To start, you’ll want to sit down and create a game plan that includes the deals you want to offer and how you want to promote them.
Once you’ve thought this through, it’s time to work backward. Figure out how much time you need to complete each Cyber Monday related task and then set deadlines for yourself.
It’s smart to also create a contingency plan in case things don’t go as planned. From prioritizing the most important tasks to recruiting some extra help, this Cyber Monday tip will make sure you put your best foot forward.
2. Prepare for the whole weekend
An important Cyber Monday tip is to keep your efforts cohesive across the holiday weekend.
From your Black Friday marketing strategy to your Small Business Saturday ideas, each promotion should align with your goals for the weekend. Whether that’s to acquire new customers or boost sales before year-end, every tactic you deploy should support your high-level objectives.
It’s also important to have a strategy for when Cyber Monday shopping comes to an end. Think about how you want to:
- Nurture new leads
- Increase your customer retention rate
- Continue the holiday momentum
3. Be strategic with what you offer
On Cyber Monday, buyers are pulled every which way. Making it hard to catch and keep their attention.
Plus, as a small business, you’re not going to be able to offer the eye-catching discounts Walmart and Amazon can. But, worry not, as all is not lost.
Rather than focusing on the size of your Cyber Monday deals, look at the value you can offer instead. If, for example, free shipping is important to your target market, go with that.
On the other hand, if shipping costs aren’t a pain for your audience, perhaps the convenience of a gift basket or the savings of a bundle deal are more attractive.
To find out what type of discounts interest your target market, you’ll need to look at your customer data.
From purchase history to communication records, this will let you see which promotions your customers engage with the most and will highlight what discounts will be the most effective.
4. Get the word out about your great deals
Once you decide what Cyber Monday deals to offer, it’s time to share them.
Before your sale starts, think about the marketing channels you want to use to promote your offers. Whether it’s organic search or paid advertising, you’ll want to reach both new and repeat customers.
To find out where to focus your marketing efforts, you can:
- Look at the performance of past marketing campaigns
- Talk to your customers
- See what your competitors are doing for Cyber Monday
Doing these 3 things will ensure that you’re investing your time and money in the places where you’re most likely to connect with buyers and make the sale.
A great Cyber Monday tip is to join the community groups your target audience uses on social media and share your offers there.
Not only will you get feedback from potential buyers on your promotion but you’ll also get your products in front of a new audience.
Personalized email campaigns are another great way to increase the visibility of your Cyber Monday deals. As within a few minutes, email campaigns let you share your offer with thousands of your lead and customer contacts.
5. Gear up to accept online payments
With 60% of buyers only shopping online this year, it’s crucial for small businesses to break into the e-commerce space.
“60% of buyers are only shopping online this holiday season.”
FlipGive, 2020.
And thankfully, this Cyber Monday tip has gotten increasingly easier for small businesses to implement.
To start, you’ll need to upload all the products you sell to your website.
Next, you’ll have to add a shopping cart function to your site. Doing this from scratch will likely be difficult, so it’s smart to take advantage of tools like Shopify and WooCommerce for this.
Next, you have to be able to accept online debit and credit card payments. While Shopify and WooCommerce offer this functionality, Method:CRM is another great tool for this — especially if you’re looking for a solution to connect your sales and accounting data.
Method:CRM offers payment gateways and online portals to make online purchases a breeze for both you and your customers.
Better yet, Method:CRM offers a free trial so you don’t have to carry any upfront costs before Cyber Monday shopping begins.
Recap: 5 Cyber Monday tips to grow your small business
Here’s a list of actionable tips you can use to make this Cyber Monday your best yet.
- Plan your Cyber Monday strategy before the online retail frenzy begins.
- Think beyond the immediate holiday season for the best long-term results.
- Use customer data to create promotions that are valuable to your target market.
- Share your Cyber Monday deals with new and existing customers through multiple marketing channels.
- Accept online orders and payments with the help of tools like Shopify, Method:CRM, and WooCommerce.
Bonus Cyber Monday tip: Check out this free ebook to learn how to increase your sales at every point of the sales cycle.
Image credit: Karolina Grabowska via Pexels
