Seasonal sales fluctuations in e-commerce: how to prepare your e-shop for better or worse periods

A guest post by Wealthon

Seasonality is a phenomenon that occurs not only in offline businesses, but also in e-commerce. It is a natural thing, and instead of fighting it, it can be used to scale your business.

In this article, we advise how to prepare your e-shop for better or worse periods.

What is seasonality in e-commerce?

Before giving advice that could serve as directions to success for your e-business, let’s see what seasonality in e-commerce is. The seasonality of internet sales is a quality that reflects consumer trends. To put it simply, these are periods of the year when sales go up or down. Seasonality is associated with fluctuations in sales, website traffic and other key business indicators that occur at regular intervals.

What causes sales seasonality?

Seasonality can be caused by various factors, such as the change of seasons, holidays, special events or even days of the week. To optimize sales or the effectiveness of activities conducted by the marketing department, it is imperative to understand these fluctuations and to be able to predict them. The cycles of better or worse sales are different for each industry. Knowing the sector you operate in will make it easier for you to choose the right tools that will facilitate data monitoring and analysis.

When is the most popular time to go shopping?

There are special occasions that cause peaks for almost every industry in terms of the number of orders, such as Christmas or Black Friday. There are also days like “Child’s Day” that are profitable only to a few industries, e.g., toy stores. Another example is Cyber Monday, mainly for electronics shops. One of the characteristics of e-shops is that the high season begins much sooner for them than on the day of the event (this year, Black Friday is on November 29th, 2024, and shops are already preparing for it) and lasts for longer than just one day (sale, servicing returns, etc.).

Cultural and sports events also contribute to the increase in the sales of specific products, such as football t-shirts and gadgets.

As for days of the week, according to CENEO Trendy na rynku e-commerce w Polsce 2023, consumers most eagerly click “Place your order” on Mondays. The hours most common for purchases are 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. and 8 p.m. to 10 p.m.

You can prepare your e-shop for these occasions, but there are also factors that are difficult to predict. The COVID pandemic has shown how phenomena of this kind greatly increase the need for some products, such as masks, disinfection liquids, etc., which are otherwise not generally popular.

A less obvious factor that influences the speed of sales are emotions. Spring is a time for motivation and the need for change. In the summer, people want to relax and live more slowly. Autumn is a return to job or school routine. Winter is a time for emotions connected with preparations for Christmas and New Year’s Eve. Specific emotions entail concrete purchasing decisions that can be predicted. Your business can be adapted to the spirit of a given season, e.g., through ads, brand voice or e-mail marketing.

How to prepare well for a season?

Good use of seasonality in e-commerce may significantly increase profits in your company. Start by adapting your marketing strategies and offers to customer needs, pay attention to technical aspects, and make sure you provide many different payment and delivery methods.

Ad campaigns

Ad platforms allow for flexible operations – depending on the budget you have. When designing ad campaigns on your own (or when delegating the task to an agency), remember that advertising systems must have the time to “learn”. The algorithm needs a moment for the optimization and adaptation of creation data to the users that can be converted. Take this into consideration if you want to reach out to potential customers at the right moment.

Ad campaigns may be conducted through different channels, such as social media, e-mail marketing or browser ads. The most important thing is for the message to be clear, and for the prices to stay the same for every medium. This is particularly important in the period of seasonal promotions. Pay attention to the fact that the price per lead increases rapidly, for example for the jewelry industry before Valentine’s Day. Prepare your budget well for this time, not to be unpleasantly surprised when it comes.

Take care of the technical side

The season when activity at your store will be increased should be preceded by solid technical preparations. The worst possible scenario is when, e.g., you communicate special offers and discounts through social media, and your customers go to your site, but it does not work. An even worse situation is when you allocate funds for ad campaigns and the traffic directed to the site hits an error screen. Make sure there are no obstacles on the customers’ purchasing path. Invest in a server with appropriate power that will handle a purchasing peak.

Remember to offer a wide range of possible payment methods (delayed payment, BLIK, fast transfers, etc.). Payments in installments have become very popular recently. According to a CRIF report, the number of customers that used this option in 2023 was 33% higher than in 2022. Follow the needs of your customers in this regard, and stay updated not to fall back behind your competition.

If you are considering the development of your business and need financial support, Wealthon has a dedicated e-commerce solution. Wealthon POSCASH financing for e-commerce is very quick – the form takes just a few minutes to complete, does not require any documents, and the credit decision is ready in 30 minutes. The payment method is also innovative – once a week. This solution makes the installments smaller when compared to a traditional bank loan, and the payment does not disturb the company’s financial processes. You can apply for a sum as high as PLN 500 000.

Check your warehousing status

It is equally important to offer diverse delivery options. If you scale your business and the stage of packaging goods in your flat on your own is behind you, then consider fulfillment companies’ services. In this case, you delegate the entire delivery chain to professionals. Thanks to systems for stock management, you will avoid the uneasy situation when your customer places an order for an item that is no longer available. Fulfillment services also entail post sales service, including time-consuming returns. Good logistics is one of the pillars of success for e-commerce. It is worth investing in logistics even at the early stage of managing an e-shop.

What activities should be performed outside the season?

Periods of decreased website traffic and lower sales can lead to frustration among e-commerce owners. However, you can perceive these periods as a time of preparation. You can spend the dead season on activities for which you do not have time during the high season of your industry.

This may be a good moment to work on the SEO of your shop (writing blog articles, optimized in terms of keywords – which takes time), or on the quality of your content in social media channels. Activities in these areas require time to give good results. Spend some time on product descriptions, category names, and the FAQ on your website.

Use the more relaxed time, e.g., after Christmas when customers limit their spending, to develop your marketing and sales strategy. Invest in analytics tools that will help you come to the right conclusions (e.g., Google Analytics, Google Trends, Ahrefs, Hotjar, Brand24). Think about adapting the visual aspect of your e-shop to upcoming events, such as Valentine’s Day or the beginning of the school year.

Conclusion

It is worth knowing how the seasonality of sales works in your industry. The knowledge of customer preferences helps better adapt the offer to their needs. Use shopping trends and be ready for them. Don’t base your decisions solely on your intuition. Analyze data (including historical data) and perform trend forecasts. This will ensure you are prepared for the best of times, while stale periods will not disrupt the finances of your company.

A guest post by Wealthon