Sales drop

Anyone else?

[Raymond]

Sales has dropped like a rock since June. I wonder if anyone else is experiencing similar trend?

FYI, our main target is the younger crowd (16 to 29). Thank you.

[derekwong28]

Most retail businesses, whether online or bricks and morter follow a U curve pattern. Sales are best during X'mas and Spring, and lowest during summer. I can assure you that if this is bad, wait until we get to the Olympics. Sales will plunge deeply then unless you are selling items connected with the Olympics.

[j4mes]

Yeah, hits take a plunge when Summer kicks in (especially here in the UK - we don't get much! :P)

This has come up a few times now, it seems to be the norm.

[wifi on the fly]

This is our 3rd year in online retail and summers have always been slow. Although if you sell suntan lotion, you might be doing alright :)

[andy_boyd]

We're seeing a similar trend, sales down. Happens every year.

This summer could be especially poor as we have the European Football Championship, closely followed by the Olympics.

[Essex_boy]

Im selling mainly on Ebay now (please forgive me) ive found that currently thinngs are going great guns.

I guess that may be because I have in built traffic so to speak.

[sem4u]

Good points about Euro 2004 and the Olympics. Sales are always slower in the summer, with things picking up in September and the run up to Christmas.

[Raymond]

It seems like there is a "sales drop" button right after June 1st. So far we are getting only 30 to 40% of the orders we usually get after that particular day. I dont know, maybe I am being paranoid.

[T_Bill]

This is our seventh year selling consumer products online. Every year sales drop towards the end of May. They hit a low right about now and begin a slow build-up until August. Towards the middle of August sales begin to grow at a much better rate right up until the Holidays. Then, the Holiday Season is always huge.

For years we have tried to boost summer sales but the problem is that the same reason that makes sales low also makes your advertising less responsive thus more costly. It's tough enough to have a good ROI when sales are good.

For the past two years we have dropped trying to use advertising to build sales this time of year and have accepted the drop. We use this time to focus on building affiliate relationships and improving our site's functions.

However, if your sales dropped 40%, I'd be concerned about it. The most we have ever dropped is 15%. Usually only about 5%. The thing we notice the most is the lack of growth. Only in May, June and July have we ever had stagnant or lost sales.

If you can, go back to old sales, check the referrer and see if the links still exist.

[Sunshyn]

We're experiencing typical, low sales for this time of year.

I'm very curious about how July is going to be. For the last 2 July's, we've had killer sales that month (almost matching the holiday season!). We were running our 10th anniversary special and then decided to do an 11th year one on whim. It was the type of thing where we give away a free small item, ~$10 retail, with a $50 or $75 purchase. However, the sales seemed out of proportion for the special. We're not planning to run one this year, partially because I'm wondering how much impact they really had.

[martyt]

My sales this month are up sharply -- especially considering I'm not running any kind of sale or promotion.

We've had some sort of sale going every month for the last year, thinking it was a "requirement" to get people to buy. But I got lazy this month and didn't run any kind of discount and have been astounded by the sales results so far this month. Kind of gives me the incentive to skip the "Take $10 off any $100 order" stuff for a while.

Overall traffic was up last week sharply from the previous week and above the average for the last month.

So if this is a bad month, I can't wait for a good one!