Pin and Facebook Your Way to Record Holiday Season Sales

Whether exciting or stressful, the 2013 holiday season is upon us. It is also a short holiday season; with just 26 shopping days between Thanksgiving and Christmas. For retailers, this means more scrambling to sell as many products as possible within a shorter period of time than during the previous year. For shoppers, it means fewer holiday shopping days and less time to find the best deals available.

Given the time constraints, both retailers and shoppers are expected to turn to online shopping options this holiday season. Retailers are rolling out their holiday campaigns earlier and banking on social media, such as Facebook and Pinterest, to boost their holiday sales. Motorcycle dealers should follow suit, especially in terms of apparel, gift card, and accessory sales.

According to Internet Retailer, 65% of U.S. consumers will search for products/services online and make their purchase in-store during the 2013 holiday season. Half of the surveyed shoppers said that they will also shop at online-only retailers, such as Amazon.com. Furthermore, eMarketer predicts that 16% of this year’s holiday season purchases will occur on mobile devices, such as tablet and smartphone.

Since most shoppers will enjoy a long Thanksgiving weekend and will then return to work on Cyber Monday, it is a smart strategy for retailers, including motorcycle dealers, to offer online deals which can be redeemed between November 29th and December 2nd. Not only will shoppers spend quality time with family and friends during the Thanksgiving weekend, but they will also spend a lot of time on Facebook and Pinterest, and most likely spend most of Cyber Monday shopping online rather than being productive at work.

As a motorcycle dealer, here are some ideas for reaching your customers online during the Thanksgiving weekend and Cyber Monday:

• If you have a significant follower base on Pinterest, create a board for Black Friday Deals and Cyber Monday Deals, and then pin 5-10 great deals to each board. Make sure that you pick popular items and that your deals are better than your usual deals on such items. Focus on items that make great holiday gifts.
• Take each of the Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals that you selected for your Pinterest boards and create a status update post for each of them on your store’s Facebook Page. Make sure to schedule the posts for different times and days to avoid cluttering your fans’ Facebook News Feed.
• To get even more exposure and sales, create Facebook ads to promote each of your Facebook Black Friday and Cyber Monday status update posts. Facebook allows you to set up a budget that is comfortable for your store/department, which means that you do not have to spend crazy amounts of money on Facebook ads. This is a great option for attracting Cyber Monday shoppers while they are checking their Facebook activity during work hours.

As always, please do not hesitate to e-mail me at mirela@chopperexchange.com, if you have questions about this blog post. I am more than happy to help.