The Christmas Rush

Has it started yet?

[andy_boyd]

I have a site which sells giftware, a lot of which is suitable for Christmas gifts. My past figures show that I should have been getting between 5 and 10 sales per day on this site since mid October. This has not materialized at all!

Is anybody else experiencing similar sales?

[Rugles]

I can report an increase in traffic and sales on a couple of sites. As I said earlier, in North America, the rush will start at the end of this week.

[powerchuter]

We are about 30% down vs. last nov. right now. All our suppliers are saying the same.

Don't know if it is because folks already bought (we had a great sept/oct) or if the season is just being delayed but we are counting pennies around here.

I don't wish anyone bad luck, but it is comforting to know it is not just us.

[iJeep]

It has been miserably slow the past couple weeks here. I have talked to suppliers and competitors and they all are saying the same. This week will have to be huge to make up for the rest of the month.

That said...Today was the first day that I felt like I actually needed to be at the phone. Hopefully the rest of the week will continue to build upon that.

[nipear]

I agree Rugles, This will be my 5th Christmas season online. Thanksgiving, the day before, or the day after are the start of the madness as I've experienced it. For all you newbies out there here are a couple tips.

Promote your last shipping day to recieve it by christmas. If you ship 3 day, let your visitors know that they have until such and such a day to buy and get it by christmas. Don't make them look for the info. If they can purchase until the 21st, let them know!

Email, Email and Email! I hope everyone here has an inhouse mailing list. From Thanksgiving to Christmas go on a 4-7 day schedule. Send out those newsletters, get them to your site. If you don't have an email list, email your past customers early and often!

Well good luck everyone!

[Essex_boy]

How odd... Im in the UK and aall my suppliers are going like mad, they supply all the major UK chainstores and judging by their overall sales Id say things are great.

Im doing well, but I do have 3 out of production and heavily advertised products on my site and yes im holding stock. So maybe thats why....

[panic]

Im doing well, but I do have 3 out of production and heavily advertised products on my site and yes im holding stock. So maybe thats why....

Could be :P

-p

[lloyd]

I have found that the beginning of the month things we not great (down on last year) but now the last two weeks it has gone mental.

I have noticed that the shops are really quiet at the moment - based in UK. So the BBC article could well be right. I don't think it is any coincedence that the mild weather didn't help at the beginning of the month and the bad weather in the last two weeks = increase in sales.

Maybe people this Christmas feel more comfortable using the web and are happier to leave their bookings for a couple of week later than last year.

[Essex_boy]

Its very erratic at the moment variance day to day of about 90%. same figures through the site.

[JoeHouse]

OK

When exactly is this Christmas rush suppose to begin?

I am new to this ecommerce game and all I kept hearing is right after ThanksGiving things will get crazy!

Well its now Nov 28th and slow as can be. Why?

My website has lots of visibilitiy on all major search engines so I do not believe thats a problem.

Are others struggling too?

I have the perfect gift items that as history shows do very well this time of year.

So when is this rush suppose to start?

Would appreciate anybody response.

Thanks!

[eyeinthesky]

More a hush than a rush.

[Essex_boy]

Yeah blink and youll miss it!

[yintercept]

My experience has been that the Monday after Thanksgiving is bigger than the day after Thanksgiving for online shopping. This was especially true when few people had decent online connections at home. In the pre dotcom bust era, companies were a little more tolerant of people wasting time online.

True to last year, the day after Thanksgiving was a complete bust on all of my web sites.

[Compworld]

I will have to agree. Friday and today we have received more traffic, but less registrations and sales. Yet, on Thursday we have more than Wednesday. My guess is that most people are on vacation, and it should pickup on Monday (I assume). Even my auctions on eBay and other auction and shopping sites are relatively slow. So, that is the only thing that I can gather from my data. Since most of America has been off (Thursday - Sunday), people are not online as much, or just browsing.

Hopefully, things will at least get back to normal (or better) on Monday.

CompWorld

[powerchuter]

Slow here also, we are going to need a big sunday just to match last years sales. That is after being up 30% on just about every month this year.

But like yintercept said, most sales take place from the office when folks get to shop on their company's time (and on their broadband connection). I am waiting to panic until after monday.

Our traffic is ahead of last year right now - in spite of some damage from update florida - so I hope folks are just spending a little more time browsing and will pull out the credit cards darn soon.

[Compworld]

Yea, it just makes no logical sense. Traffic is up for our main site by almost 22%, but sales and registrations are down. You would think the increased trafic would lead to increased sales and registrations, but no. It seems that has been the norm for the regular merchants.

I wonder how the big guys have done. I am sure we well hear about it within the next 24 hours from CNBC and other busienss networks.

CompWorld

[JoeHouse]

It appears that most of the increase traffic is probably from other merchants checking out what everyone else is doing because we all seem to be struggling this year.

I think early part of the week Mon, Tues, and Wed will tell the true story of how this thing will all shake out for this holiday.

[HighPR]

Have you seen these articles about the timing and success of the Christmas sales season? Moderator NOTE: This isn't blatent self-promotion - it's just the only link that I know definitively points to this information. Hope I'm not breaking rules by posting:

[cpureview.com...]

[cpureview.com...]

They mention both the timing and the anticipated volume of online holiday sales.

[panic]

The Christmas Rush has officially begun.

[Compworld]

Eh,

It was better yesterday than today. Its early, so maybe it will increase throughout the day.

CompWorld

[andy_boyd]

Things have clearly picked up yesterday and today, we have seen a higher volume of sales coming through on all our sites. However, because of where I am based my shipping deadline for Christmas delivery is 11th December, which means 14 days of nothing. :-(

Let's hope we all get plenty of the green stuff after what has been a very tough last couple of months - for me at least.

[Compworld]

I second that. From your mouth to G-d's ears. :) Their was a pickup yesterday, but now its down again. Very strange. Probably just do to the fact that its the first day back from a four day weekend.

CompWorld

[powerchuter]

started picking up a bit late yesterday,

today feels like "old times" I hope it continues to build since we only have a couple of weeks left because of shipping time.

[eyeinthesky]

Still no rush for me. Maybe the Christmas rush only happens at physical stores?

Then it will be a Christmas hush for online stores?

Remember reading somewhere on this forum someone said Christmas season is his slowest period.

Guess it depends on what you sell online.

[your_store]

We started ramping up last Tuesday, but we didn't hit the season full on until Sunday. Steady growth since then.

If only Christmas was on the 30th, we could squeeze another week out of this ;)

[RedWolf]

We also started ramping up on Tues and Wednesday was or biggest day for total orders. Monday was better for gross sales because I sent a newsletter out and had a couple of collectors pickup big pieces which really helped. Otherwise, I am having more sales than the same period last year, but at about half the average sale amount. It seems that almost all of my sales last month were in the sub $50 items. The last two years, I sold out of most of my $100 to $300 items by mid December. Even if the sales are small they are going extremely well so far.

[lloyd]

I seem to be really lucky compared to some of you. I'm smashing all records. I have doubled sales on one site and there is a healthy increase on the other. Had I been allowed to apply some additional SEO practices to the site I think it would be even more.

I would have to agree with RedWolf. I think that the average spend could be down on last year though. Whether that is to do with products or general spending power is not yet clear (UK Market).

[Essex_boy]

Should be interesting to see what happens in the UK big losses have been posted on the news combine that with interest rate increases.

Oh well..

[isorg]

For those who have noticed increased visitors but no increase in sales to match - this could be a result of the recent google update (and the visitors are not that interested).

Something to consider.

[4crests]

Yesterday was the biggest day we have ever had. We broke our one day sales record that we set last year. Last years record came on December 5th. I love it!

[uksports]

--Yesterday was the biggest day we have ever had. We broke our one day sales record that we set last year. Last years record came on December 5th. I love it!--

Same for us - yesterday was exceptional - still good today but not at the same manic level as yesterday.

Looking at last year, we went on all the way to the 20th before it died, so a good couple of weeks to go (I hope) especially if we can have a few more days like 'Wild Wednesday'