Discover 4 effective strategies to maximize your Mother’s Day sales by tapping into consumer spending behaviours. Read on to learn how you can sell more this year.
4 Ways To Sell More On Mother’s Day
1) Offer Convenience
Approximately one-quarter of shoppers prioritize convenience when choosing a Mother’s Day gift. To cater to these busy shoppers, ensure that your store and website offer a hassle-free shopping experience.
One effective approach is to set up a point-of-purchase display showcasing your Mother’s Day merchandise. Use signage to guide customers to the display so they can quickly find and purchase the perfect gift.
Maximize your sales potential by leveraging your website or ecommerce store. Creating a dedicated section for Mother’s Day gifts is an excellent way to drive sales. Make it easier for your customers by including product recommendations, such as a “Top Products for Mother’s Day” or “Most Popular Gifts for Mom” section.
If you have an ecommerce store, consider promoting popular fulfillment options on your website, such as Buy Online, Pick Up In Store (BOPIS) to encourage safe and convenient purchases.
2) Give Your Shoppers Gifting Inspiration
Over 80% of shoppers rely on retailers for inspiration when selecting gifts, presenting an opportunity for businesses to provide creative solutions. One way to cater to these shoppers is by developing a gift guide that offers unique and thoughtful ideas for Mother’s Day.
To create an effective gift guide, begin creating gift ideas suitable for various types of mother figures such as aunts, grandmothers, godmothers, and new mothers. While your guide should showcase items available in your store, you can also incorporate unique and personalized gift ideas, for example, homemade options.
Ensure that your gift guide is easily accessible to shoppers by featuring it on your website homepage. Given that many customers will be searching the internet for gift ideas, placing the guide in a visible location and including a call to action such as “Looking for the perfect gift for mom? Explore our Mother’s Day gift guide!” can help draw their attention and encourage engagement with your brand.
Not only will this create a better shopping experience for your customers, it will also help you appear higher up in search results.
You can also create email guides to send to your mailing list and printable guides to give to walk-in shoppers.
3) Run Google Shopping Ads For Last Minute Shoppers
With 84% of adults expected to celebrate Mother’s Day, it’s safe to say that many last-minute shoppers will be frantically searching online for gift ideas. To reach these time-pressed customers, consider using the power of GoogleAds to promote your products and special offers to local shoppers. By listing your merchandise on Google and optimizing your ads to target nearby consumers, you can effectively capture the attention of these last-minute shoppers and drive sales.
Here are some tips for driving traffic to your website or store prior to Mother’s Day:
Maximize the visibility of your Mother’s Day merchandise and minimize advertising costs by creating a dedicated campaign for these products, using custom labels to differentiate them from your regular inventory.
Increase your chances of converting shoppers into buyers by utilizing remarketing lists to specifically target individuals who have already engaged with your website. This includes those who have previously visited your site, returning customers, and those who have abandoned their shopping carts online.
Use descriptive titles and high-quality images.
Given that 15% of shoppers are looking for cost-effective gift options, it’s important to ensure that your promotional offers are easily accessible and visible to potential customers. One effective way to accomplish this is by prominently featuring your promotions on your Merchant Center.
Incorporate relevant holiday keywords into your product titles and descriptions to help increase your visibility and drive traffic to your website. Consider targeting general keywords like “Mother’s Day Gift,” “Gift Ideas for Mother’s Day,” “Mother’s Day Flowers,” and other similar phrases that shoppers are likely to search for.
That’s why it’s a great idea to create unique gift baskets for different shoppers
Some good ideas include a Mother’s Day Skincare Gift Basket and a Mother’s Day Healthy Snack Gift Basket. Click here for more Mother’s Day basket ideas.
Gift baskets can be an excellent option for shoppers who are struggling to come up with the perfect gift for their mom. Consider grouping discounted items with regular-priced items in each basket to create a sense of added value and make shoppers feel like they’re getting more for their money.
Increase your sales potential this Mother’s Day by strategically up-selling and cross-selling gift baskets to every shopper who walks through your doors. By bundling products together in a gift basket, you can increase your store’s average order value and offer customers a more complete gifting solution.
Despite its simple appearance, the barcode is a powerful tool in the retail industry that boosts efficiency and makes shopping easier. This year marks the 50th anniversary of barcode technology. In fact, the BBC considers it one of the 50 things that made the modern economy by revolutionizing inventory management, store checkout, and manufacturing.
The barcode went through several milestones. The person credited with inventing the barcode is Joseph Woodland. During his career, Woodland worked at IBM and even worked on the Manhattan project during World War II. The barcode came about when Woodland noticed that three dashes and a dot resemble the letter “J” in Morse code. This was the spark that led to the creation of the pattern recognized around the world today.
After World War II, the West experienced a boom which created plenty of opportunities in the retail industry. This is when Woodland introduced the barcode as a retail solution, specifically to solve the problem of supermarket staff taking too long to organize and deal with products.
The prototypes
The interesting thing is that the barcode itself was not the main challenge for Woodland. Instead, the real challenge was in the creation of a reliable device that could easily read barcodes. Woodland initially looked at the movie industry, where a device called a “phonofilm” shone light through slits. A computer would then electronically read the light to produce sound waves. Eventually, Woodland realized that the light did not have to shine through the slits but could instead reflect off the bars and back into the device to read the information.
At the start, Woodland created a prototype of a “barcode reader” by using a 500-watt light bulb inside a box made of thick black oilcloth to keep out daylight. The bulb would shine a narrow beam onto a paper sheet with black and white lines, which reflected the light into a pickup device. The device would then converted it into a unique electronic signal. However, the light was too intense, causing the paper to catch on fire. This led Woodland to put the idea on hold because he could not find a light that could reflect the barcode without causing it to ignite.
The idea of the barcode resurfaced in the 1960s with the invention of lasers—an ultra-focused ray of light that could scan back and forth across a label without setting the paper on fire. The first official design of the barcode was made in the 1970s, once lasers became reliable enough. The initial design was circular and resembled a bullseye. To promote his new innovation, Woodland included the chance to win a prize for those who scanned the barcode.
As you know, the evolution of the barcode did not stop with the circular design. The circular shape presented its own challenges. For the scanner to read the barcode, it required clear print and an undented tin. Enter George Laurer, who would play a critical role in the redesign of the barcode. Ultimately, he decided to return to the original rectangle design, which proved to be highly successful.
In June 1974, the barcode made its first appearance at a Marsh’s supermarket in Ohio. The first item scanned was a 10-pack of Juicy Fruit gum, priced at $0.67. This historic moment marked the beginning of millions of barcode scans to come.
The most common barcode today is still the traditional rectangular barcode that most of us see every day on products. These type of barcodes are called 1D or one-dimensional barcodes.
With modern personal computing and smartphones, traditional barcodes have helped to inspire newer barcode technologies as well.
QR Codes
QR codes (a topic we’ve looked into before on this blog) are 2D or two-dimensional barcodes that can store more information than traditional barcodes. They can be read from any angle and contain more information in less space, making them versatile for a variety of uses. Retailers use QR codes to direct customers to product information, reviews, and promotional content. QR codes have also become popular in mobile payments, allowing customers to complete transactions quickly and securely. This has helped to streamline payment processes and provide a more convenient shopping experience for customers.
RFID
RFID, also known as “radio frequency identification”, is a further extension of traditional barcodes. It is essentially a tag (or label) with built-in devices that use radio frequencies to transfer data. RFID technology has several advantages over standard 1D barcodes. RFID tags can be read from a distance and do not require direct line of sight to the scanner, making them more convenient to use. They are also capable of storing more information and can be modified or changed.
RFID tags are useful in many ways. As the cost of labor and staffing shortage have grown over the past decade, more and more retailers have started to use RFIDs track inventory and minimize theft.
For example, large retailers such as Zara have switched to RFID for faster physical inventory counts. Where before physical inventory count required a lot of staff (and possibly closing the stores), RFID makes stock take as simple as several quick scans of the store. Larger stores have even added overhead RFID scanners to be able to track the location of products to make it easier for shelf restock and locating inventory.
As the cost of RFID tags (and tagging products) continues to go down, RFID will increasingly be used by smaller retailers in a greater variety of ways.
The barcode has revolutionized the modern retail industry as we know it today. The sound of the beep at a supermarket checkout instantly reminds us of the barcode. It is not just a series of black and white lines, but technology that has significantly improved the efficiency of stores and continues to shape modern retail.
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