Achieving holiday eCommerce success with gift guides
By: Codal Inc.
Tags: Black Friday, Ecommerce, Ecommerce Web Development, Gift Guide, Ecommerce Marketing

In 2020, Black Friday/Cyber Monday (BFCM) sales totaled $5.1 billion globally. That’s not to mention the rest of the holiday season, which seems to stretch earlier and earlier into November every year. For eCommerce businesses, the holiday season is an optimal time to achieve sales goals and attract new consumers in the hopes of turning first-time purchasers into loyal customers.

However, many companies fail to capitalize on the gifting season. Due to a lack of preparedness, poor planning, ineffective marketing, or a whole host of other issues, many online retailers experience disappointing sales during the holidays.

Creating a holiday gift guide is a low-stakes effort that can pay off big time for eCommerce businesses looking to boost their holiday sales. In this post, we’ll outline what makes holiday gift guides successful, as well as best practices for launching your own.

Benefits of a holiday gift guide

A gift guide is a valuable tool for both consumers and eCommerce businesses alike. Let’s examine some of the key benefits of publishing a holiday gift guide for online retailers.

Increase conversions

It’s no secret that the holidays can be stressful, especially when it comes to gift-giving. Customers want to make sure they purchase thoughtful gifts for their loved ones, but often don’t have a ton of time to research potential purchases extensively. This is where gift guides come in handy.

Gift guides are resources for consumers, helping them to streamline their selection process and reduce friction that can discourage them from making purchases. As curated lists, gift guides help customers that are likely short on time narrow down choices and make educated decisions about what to purchase. Reducing friction is at the heart of optimizing your eCommerce experience for conversions.

Improve your email marketing efforts

According to Publitas, marketing emails that feature gift guides generate 48% higher transaction rates compared to other promotional content. This is because gift guides offer direct value to your customers. Consumers are more likely to engage with marketing materials that offer content that benefits directly. They perceive gift guides to be tools that will help make their lives easier when it comes to purchasing holiday gifts.

By offering content that directly impacts your customers, you improve the performance of your email marketing efforts, while creating brand awareness and encouraging customers to make purchases.

Boost your eCommerce site’s SEO performance

Holiday gift guides provide the perfect template to boost your search engine optimization (SEO) performance during the competitive holiday season.

Search engines view holiday gift guides as extremely valuable to searchers. This means an engaging holiday gift guide is likely to get pushed up higher in search results, making it easier for customers to get directed to your site. Plus, gift guides can be optimized for specific keywords your company has chosen to target for the holiday season, helping you rank higher on the search results page than your competitors.

Holiday gift guides can help you take advantage of SEO to increase your company’s visibility during the busy holiday season.

Creating a holiday gift guide

Creating a holiday gift guide is a relatively low-effort way of educating your customers about products, acquiring new customers, and boosting conversions. Let’s look at what you need to get started.

Pick a theme

Just throwing a bunch of random products into a list and calling it a gift guide isn’t going to cut it. Your holiday gift guide should be organized around a specific theme to ensure customers get relevant product suggestions. Remember, customers aren’t making purchases for themselves, they’re browsing for gifts with a specific person — or price point — in mind.

Tailor the theme of your gift guide to customer segments that gel with your brand. Think, “A holiday gift guide for dads,” or, “What to get the outdoors fanatic in your life,” or, “Best holiday gifts under $20.”

Choose your products

This one’s a no-brainer. In order to assemble a successful gift guide, you’ll need to accurately match your products to the guide’s theme. It’s not as simple as just plugging in every possible item available on your eCommerce site that could fit.

To be truly valuable to your customers, a gift guide needs to be carefully curated. Be thoughtful about choosing quality products that will resonate with your customers.

Also, consider the economics of the holiday season for your brand. Do you generally launch new products in November and December? Consider adding them to your gift guide. Are there specific items that allow for larger markups? Add those to your gift guide to boost profits. Got a popular product that sells well year-round? Feature it in your gift guide to entice new customers.

Any product you feature on your holiday gift guide will need to be readily available throughout the entire holiday season. The last thing you want is to recommend customers purchase a product that will sell out a couple of weeks into the season. Make sure all products featured are easy to source and your fulfillment processes are built to withstand an uptick in purchases.

Create a marketing strategy

Your holiday gift guide will only be as successful as the marketing plan you initiate to promote it. Hone in on crucial SEO keywords by conducting keyword research and include them in your guide to ensure it ranks near the top on a web search results page. Incorporate keywords and phrases prominently into product descriptions, titles, categories, image file names, and more.

Promote your holiday gift guide in your newsletters and other email marketing efforts to customers. Advertise your gift guide on your social media channels, using relevant hashtags to target your desired customer segments. The key is to make your gift guide as visible as possible, so utilize the full extent of your marketing capabilities to promote it.

Achieving holiday sales success

The holiday season offers an incredible opportunity for eCommerce companies to boost sales and expand their customer base. So setting your store up for success might just be the most important thing you do all year. Launching a gift guide is one strategy for achieving success during the busy holiday season. But there are numerous other approaches that can help your brand come out on top.

At Codal, we’re a web development and design agency that specializes in eCommerce. Our mission is to help eCommerce companies drive revenue through beautifully designed websites and applications with seamless customer experiences. We’d love to learn more about your business and develop a strategy to help maximize your holiday performance.

Want to learn more about Codal’s eCommerce capabilities? Get in touch with Codal today!