Whether it’s Gen Z students enjoying the summer holidays, Millennials heading on a summer getaway or Baby Boomers spending more time in the garden, sunny summer days see all demographics swap online for outside. Unsurprisingly, online shopping sales tend to slump in the summer months with June traditionally the worst sales month of the year for non-summer related products.
However, with some creative marketing, innovative pricing and out-of-the-box thinking, online marketplace sellers can avoid the summer sales slump. Here’s five ways to do it.
During summer’s balmy temperatures, traditional outdoor products experience their yearly surge of popularity, such as UK supermarkets seeing a 90% increase in garden furniture sales. But even if your products are not very ‘summery’, you can ‘summer-fy’ your listings.
Changing keywords and product descriptions to reflect the suitability of your products for the sunny season can help you increase sales. For instance, if you usually sell board games, make sure the listings on marketplaces state their suitability for caravan trips or entertaining kids in bad weather. This also works for consumers staying at home this summer or planning a staycation by marketing your products for use in the garden, BBQs, family celebrations or at-home entertaining.
For some marketplace sellers, the summer is the perfect period to analyse sales, review competitor pricing and get creative with offers incentivising purchases (i.e. 2-for-1 deals or free ‘summer shipping’). But it’s also the time when some of the world’s biggest online marketplaces organise sales days.
This year, Amazon is hosting Amazon Prime Day on July 11-12, Walmart Plus Week is lasting from July 10-13 and Target Circle Week is stretching from July 9-15. These sales days are usually reserved for the marketplace’s ‘core members (i.e. Amazon Prime members) and offer large discounts on a wide range of products. Sellers can take advantage by selecting a range of deals, discounts, and promotions on its listings on these sites. This could be a Prime Exclusive Discount, social media promo codes or Amazon Lightning Deals. Whatever you decide, make sure to ramp up your marketing on social channels in the run-up to these events as the larger than usual traffic on these days can lead to sales jumps instead of sales slumps.
Discounts and innovative pricing strategies are not reserved for sales days. Instead, take the time over the summer to try out new strategies to offload unwanted stock. This could be ‘buy one get one half price’ style deals or putting more of your stock on sites that specialise in second-hand and discount retail, such as eBay - which only lags behind Amazon in terms of monthly visits (nearly 3 billion) - and OnBuy, a UK-based discount marketplace with 35 million products and 7 million customers.
What’s more, with consumers out and about more often on summer weekends, Monday becomes a great time to try out a sales promotion to offload stock (i.e. families may want a TV upgrade after seeing their relatives' new flat screen).
Weddings or walks, gardening or glamping, in the park or on the boat. During the summer, your customers are much more likely to be scrolling marketplaces on their phone than their desktop. The majority of shoppers (55.4%) use their phones to buy products throughout the year (especially Gen Z and Millenials), so online marketplace sellers should make it as easy as possible for them to make purchases on the go in the summer months.
Brands should optimise their listings for scrolling (i.e. reducing image sizes for quicker loading speeds, using simple and concise descriptions and avoiding pop-ups) to boost sales and minimise cart abandonment.
It’s not summer everywhere. While your products might not be ‘in-season’ in the northern hemisphere, they may well be ‘in-season’ on the other side of the Equator, so consider selling on online marketplaces in other parts of the world.
For example, Mercado Libre is Latin America’s largest marketplace generating $10 billion in sales from 18 countries, many of which are currently entering winter conditions, such as Brazil and Chile. On the other hand, Catch is known as ‘Australia’s favourite superstore’ and is particularly known for its bargains. But remember: if selling internationally, make sure to localise your listings for optimal results and check to see if it’s viable for your products and business model.
Summer optimization
Like optimising your summer wardrobe with a few Hawaiian shirts, get in touch with eManaged to optimise your summer sales at hello@emanaged.co.uk.