Chances are if you sell a service or tangible items your sales will decrease this season compared to 2014 holiday season.  Among all the popular reasons poor pricing, poor marketing, diminished brand power; is amazon and google.  Your two greatest allies are also your greatest enemies.  Several major changes their services and the way your customers use them have greatly affected businesses across all industries.  I will outline the major changes and your solutions to ensure the best sales possible.

Mobilegeddon

April 21, 2015, Google released a Mobile-friendly requirement to their algorithm force a  decline in visits to thousands of interneteers.  Web Based business and even brick & mortar retailers are losing ranking due to inefficiencies in their website.  In other words, Google is requiring your website is responsive  in order to rank.  Many business owners fail to update their website assuming that the content is for their customers and not google.  Unfortunately, if you choose not to play by Google’s rules you are choosing to lose customers.  In a world where 60%-70% of business leads are digital, we say that’s a lot of FREAKIN’ money lost.  Although, the solution to this is easy you may need to find a developer to determine if you are playing by the rules

Are You Playing By The Rules?

In many cases building a website that is responsive can take a few weeks to a few months.  What google is looking for is easy reading and media queries within your website style sheet.  The lesser known attributes deals with font size and container wash sizes.  Once you make those changes you can re-index your website with google and begin to work your way back to the top.  Before you panic, remember that Google’s objective is offer the most relevant content to its searchers (users).  You may lose a few points over the course of a few months.  However, if you have never been rank high you should be concerned.

 

Amazon’s Sales Approach

In a effort to respond to their customers Amazon is stepping up on reviews and seasonal discounts in order to increase usership and profits.  Amazon recently suspend many sales accounts due to fake/false reviews.  As a result the are actively seeking reviews from their customers through their wildly popular mobile app and emails.  Collecting reviews has always been a part of their business model however, the recent update to the mobile app comes packed with notifications.  This reminder system give Amazon and their retailers the ability to insert their existence into the customer’s life daily.  Ultimately steering convenient sales and services through the app.

 

Fight Fire With Fire

I don’t recommend you compete with Amazon at all.  However, you can join them and sell your products and services with them.  You are able to integrate your active shopping cart with Amazon thus automatically uploading your new products and removing your out of stock products.

 

Prevent Holiday Sales Loss

While it’s not an easy thing to achieve you may at least prevent the total loss of holiday sales.  As with most business topics the goal is to stay informed and remember that it’s a way of life.  You can find a web development agency that should be able to make this changes and integrations quickly for you.  As always your feedback and comments are welcome.