13.11.2018

Online merchants in a Christmas frenzy

Online merchants be prepared. Paymill has tips and tricks for online merchants on how to best manage the most desirable selling time of the year. 

In the middle of the never-ending summer of 2018, the first supermarkets offered gingerbread at the beginning of September. That may be exaggerated at temperatures where everyone craved an outdoor pool and ice cream. But since the discount battles for Black Friday and Cyber Monday swapped over the big pond from the USA with Thanksgiving at the end of November, the German online trade, like the stationary trade, must ring in the years end business much earlier.

The cash desks are burning

Because as the saying goes: “Cash registers never sound sweeter than at Christmas time”. According to the German Retail Association (Handelsverband Deutschland HDE), in the last two months of the previous year around 12.2 billion euros were turned over in online retailing and thus around a quarter of the total annual turnover of 48.7 billion euros, with a strong upward trend.

The main sales drivers were toys, books, consumer electronics, watches and jewellery as well as cosmetics and body care products. The popular Christmas gifts also included gift vouchers, cultural offerings, clothing, wellness and travel. Online shops that don’t yet know what to focus on can use them as a guide. But they don’t have to, they can also follow new trends.

Visual impressions also count

Whether stationary retail or online shops, the eye buys too. For online merchants this means that they should decorate their Internet presence just as festively as shops do. In view of the fact that more and more online customers are making mobile purchases, however, care should be taken to ensure that the shop design is not too overloaded. Wherever the goods on offer allow it, it may also be a little kitschy, but here too it is a matter of healthy eye proportion and sure instinct. Hello Kitty is not a good choice for do-it-yourselfers, but rather for toys and stationery. Whether this and other brand images can be used for advertising at all is a different matter.

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Source title image: PAYMILL GmbH

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