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How to Prep Your Website for Holiday Traffic?

You might not go to the holidays without prepping up if you run a gift shop. Similarly, going on holidays without prepping up your website should be considered a sin. It is because this is the time when people shop online the most.

Although prepping up a website should be done quarterly, the holiday is when it needs updating and upgrading the most. It should be smooth and easy to use without any hassle and confusion so that you do not sweat more.

Let us see what prepping up needs to be done:

1. Work Upon Loading Speed

Any website needs to load faster during the holiday season because more people shop from there. They do not have the patience to sit through the loading, and you cannot afford to lose a single customer during the holiday season.

Image size plays a massive role in loading the website, so it should be compressed as much as possible. If not, you can remove a few familiar elements that take up the space for the time being and add them again once the season is over. You can also shrink a few graphical elements if you need to work the website in your favor during the holiday season.

2. Stock up the Inventory and Update It on the Website

The holiday season is the season of high demand. Hence, you must update the stock on a continuous basis. If the product goes out of stock, you need to update its availability on the website immediately. It will create a good impression when you are honest about your stock.

3. Holiday Buyers Can Be Permanent Customers

It is a golden chance for brands to convert holiday buyers into regular customers. If people like your product during holidays, they’ll buy it on other occasions, such as birthdays, valentine’s day, anniversaries, graduations, etc. And that is the ultimate goal, to retain and sustain the existing customers and gain new ones.

This is the time to deliver your best product/services to the people who come to you for advanced or last–minute shopping. You can ask them to fill out questionnaires and forms and gather their data for future use. Thus, revamping the website for the holiday season will give you a golden chance to convert your holiday customers into regular and loyal ones.

4. Focus On User – Experience

User Experience matters the most while getting your website ready for the customers. They should be able to navigate through the website easily. It should be smooth and easy to browse, the checkout process should be a hassle–free, the loading speed should be maximum, and it should not show sold out. Thus, it should be tested and updated repeatedly to ensure that the user has the best e-commerce user experience while shopping with you.

5. Holiday Emails – Newsletters

Email marketing is the best way to drive traffic to the website. Get ready to use all the data you have gathered in past years and send out holiday emails or newsletters to inform people what you have in your basket for them. Prepare the emails to shoot out and schedule them so they will be shot out on time. Link the discounts to the carousel on the home page to get the optimum results.

6. Social Media Integration

Linking the website to your social media accounts will benefit the website and social media. Along with growing followers on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok, you can post promotional content on social media and link it to the website. Not a single soul who is capable of buying would not have a social media account. Thus, integrating it with the website will attract more customers, especially if you own an E-commerce website.

7. Revitalize the Website

Rejuvenation is necessary for human beings, and revitalizing is necessary for the website. It is one of the most effective ways to greet old loyal customers and welcome new ones. Keeping an eye out for new home page designs will pique customers’ interest in your brand. One can learn how to do it if expert website development companies are available for that.

8. Promote the Old Content

Look into last year’s data and analyze what worked out for you and what did not. Classics like courtesy and suits and polka dots never go out of style; similarly, old content that has worked out for you in the past year would work out for you like a charm this year. But see to it that it aligns with the public’s interest and the trends going on.

If you are thinking about using the content which was used pre-corona period, then people might not be able to relate to it, but post – corona content could work like a charm for this year and the years to come. Reusing the content, if it sold like hotcakes then, can be to your advantage. Hence, sort out and use it creatively. Tweek it a little, and you are good to go.

9. Site Security Is a Pressing Issue

Holidays are the favourite few days of hackers and online crime committers. Thus, ensuring that your site is safe is a pressing issue. To save your website from being hacked or crashed, you must protect it by installing a good firewall, having a firm password policy, taking regular backups, updating it repeatedly, using paid plugins as they are more robust, and so on.

Also, it is essential to keep your knowledge updated about cybercrime security news in your country and the world. Because hackers could be sitting in Ethiopia and hacking your website in California, you cannot neglect or overlook site security just because you have lots on your plate.

10. Customer Service on Toes

Holidays are the busiest time of the year, and it is precisely when customer services should be on their toes. People might get stuck on your website and need help from time to time. But if they do not receive help on time, they might not patiently wait and switch to the other website. You will end up losing your potential customer not only for the holiday season but a potential customer for longer.

Wrapping Up:

Prepping the website for the holiday season is a small task, but it is crucial and should be planned. With stocking up the inventory and focusing on pricing and other tasks like offers and discounts, you might not have the chance to do it later. Thus, this task should be left to expert web designing companies, who will take care of everything for you.