5 Tips for last-minute holiday sales

Whether your business is brick and mortar or 100% online, the last few weeks of the year can represent a big opportunity for sales. This year has been challenging for many retailers, so you may need to try some new tactics to capture that last-minute revenue. Here are five tips to take advantage of the season of giving to boost your sales. 

1. Make gift giving as easy as possible

You want to make it easy for customers to buy their holiday gifts from you. To do this, you can:

• Offer online gift cards. Some people aren’t willing or able to go into a store to buy a gift, or they want to easily send a gift to someone they won’t see for the holidays. Companies like GiftFly and GiftUp offer digital gift card services for businesses. 
• Offer gift wrapping. This is a great way to add value to a purchase. You can wrap gifts that are bought in your store or even ship gifts already wrapped. 
• Provide convenient delivery options. Your business may already routinely ship purchases, but some local stores don’t. Consider providing local delivery, either by your own staff or a delivery company. Or, offer curbside pickup, with purchases concealed in paper bags or boxes so you don’t give away the surprise!

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2. Have a flash sale

If you have specific merchandise you’d like to see fly out the door, consider a flash sale. Identify a few items – not too many, because you don’t want to overwhelm your customers – and create a short-term promotion. Depending on the type of business, and whether you’re physical or virtual, your flash sale can last an hour or a day. Advertise it on social media platforms, by email blasts, and any other way you communicate with customers. 

Related: 6 Local marketing tips for small businesses

3. Bundle products

Put two or more complimentary products together and offer them for a slightly lower price than you’d charge individually. This is particularly effective for businesses that carry items with relatively low ticket prices. You make more on each sale, and the customer can cross more gifts off their list. 

4. Create a subscription model

For food and beverage products in particular, a subscription can make a great gift and be a year-round revenue-generator. The customer buys a subscription, and you ship out the product every month. It may be a different variety of the same type of product (coffee or cookies, for example), or a different product each month (a warm scarf in January, a floppy beach hat in July). 

5. Send a greeting

Sending a holiday greeting to your customers may be the thing that reminds them about an item you carry or a service you offer. But your holiday greeting shouldn’t sell anything – it should just be an acknowledgement of your gratitude for your customers throughout the year. Any sales it generates will be an added bonus. 

Your greeting could be sent in the postal mail, by email, or posted on social media. Regardless of how you send it, it should be heartfelt and genuine. And remember – no selling!

Despite all we have to do this time of year, it’s important to pull out all the stops to get those year-end sales in. You don’t want to look back in January and think about what else you could have done. So try a few of these sales ideas and see if you can boost your sales before the new year.