Global Ecommerce Trends And Statistics For The Holiday And Festive Season 2023

2023 holiday and festive sales are going to be bigger than ever!

Going by recent reports and statistics, eCommerce stores must start preparing to gear up for the season — deals & offers, discounts, gifts, flash sales, mobile campaigns, social media, faster delivery, and stocked inventories, there’s a lot to do.

We took a look at the key trends and statistics for the 2023 holiday and festive season that might impact your Shopify sales this year. 

Read this article if you want to know the best trends and how you can lean into them to boost your holiday and festive season sales this year.

Ecommerce Holiday & Festive Season Statistics For 2023

• Global holiday season sales will reach $1.2 trillion
• Retail holiday spending will increase by 4.5% this year
• Thanksgiving and Christmas will see the highest amount of spending
• 91% of customers say free shipping influences their purchase decision
• Holiday shopping adds up to around 30% of eCommerce stores’ annual sales

Take a look at the infographic:

Source

10 holiday season trends and tips to follow

Based on our analysis of how leading brands prepare for the holiday season, here are some trends and tips to follow: 

1. Inventory forecasting and planning 

Consumers tend to buy a lot during the holiday season as everything is on discount. But their excitement could easily turn into disappointment because of poor inventory management.

For example, instances of stock-out during sale and delayed deliveries due to poor inventory management are common.  

To avoid stock-outs on your online store, you must plan and prepare the inventory carefully. Inventory forecasting and planning is an eCommerce holiday season requirement most experts emphasize on.

And the best way to plan inventory?

Analyze customers’ past shopping behavior and patterns. The Shopify customer account page is the best place to turn to, collect data, and get a sense of what to restock and how much.

Here’s data that can help you plan your inventory better for the holiday season:

• Collect data from the last holiday season
• Past purchase patterns of customers
• Data from customers’ wishlists
• Collect data of different kinds from the customer account page
• Look at ‘reorders’, ‘recently viewed products’ sections to identify products that could be in demand during the shopping season

2. Omnichannel shopping experience

Digital savviness has increased in the last few years, thanks to the pandemic. Customers no longer shop from only websites. They prefer multi-channel shopping — browse on social media, explore more on apps, and purchase from the website — a mix of interconnected platforms. 

And they expect their favorite brands to provide this convenience. Ecommerce brands can retain 89% of customers when they apply omnichannel strategies. 

Here are some tips to focus on omnichannel experience during the festive season:

• Interconnect and integrate all the platforms so customers can start from where they left, no matter the channel
• Provide a consistent and personalized experience across channels
• Set up special omnichannel strategies specifically designed for the holiday season
• Get an understanding of your customers via the customer account page and their preferred channels
• Learn how to use your Shopify tools to connect and sync all the channels
• Keep the customer account page at the center of your omnichannel strategy 
• Optimize all channels for a good customer account page experience

3. Early sales

A common eCommerce holiday season trend being noticed since the last few years is early sales. Customers prefer to start shopping early, and retailers are getting ready earlier — beginning of October and November.

There are many benefits to starting early. Retailers can get a headstart as well as decrease the stress and overload of too many deliveries. 

Customers, too, can get on-time deliveries and space out their important purchases over two to three months.

Here’s how you can incorporate this eCommerce trend for the 2023 shopping season:

• Plan your holiday season and festive sales much earlier, from August and September
• Launch your holiday season marketing campaigns before your competitors
• Start sales and discounts earlier than December, from October and November
• Plan your inventory and logistics accordingly
• Utilize social media to spread awareness
• Promote early shopping for festive gifts and run offers

4. Extended holiday season

Not only will shoppers start shopping earlier this festive season, they’re also going to shop beyond the key dates. And that is why extended holiday and festive season sales are going to be a key eCommerce trend for 2023.

Here are some cues to extend your holiday season sales:

• Extend the sales by a few days – 3 to 4 days
• Promote sale date extension on all channels
• Create FOMO and urgency during the extended dates
• Save some products for the extended sale so as to attract customers
• Plan sale extension before the holiday season begins so you can do it well

5. Personalization during sales

Customers are used to high-level personalized shopping experiences during the year. They expect the same during sales too. However, with so much going on during peak season, brands could ignore the personalization aspect and miss out on capturing sales.

That can be changed by integrating personalization as a strategy within your eCommerce holiday season plan.

Here are a few things you could do:

• Set up Shopify customer account page if you haven’t — that’s where you can engage customers and collect data
• Ensure your Shopify customer account page is functional and has all the important elements up and running
• Use data from the customer account page to run real-time offers and promotions for customers
• For example, if customers add items to their wishlists during the sale, offer them incentives to make immediate purchases

6. Increase in Mcommerce sales

Mcommerce is one of the biggest holiday season 2023 trends. Studies say this year’s mobile commerce holiday season sales will increase by double digits. So you definitely want to optimize your brand’s mobile experience for Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Christmas, Thanksgiving, and the holiday season this year.

Let’s find out how to boost your Mcommerce ROI:

• Sudden spikes in traffic can cause your mobile site or app to crash. Be prepared and ensure your platforms are ready for the surge
• Optimize your mobile platforms such as app and mobile site for an enhanced customer account page experience by following best practices
• Invest in integrating features such as live chat, automated messaging and updates, etc. for your mobile platforms

Also read: How To Optimize Your Shopify Mobile Ecommerce Store In 2023

7. Value beyond discounts

It’s 2023! Discounts have become the least attractive incentives. Because every brand offers discounts. And it’s possible that other brands are offering more discounts than you are. 

Instead, customers now look for value. Think free shipping, faster delivery, same-day delivery, product bundles, exciting gifts, good post purchase experience, among others.

Here are some ways you can increase value for your customers:

• Give your loyal customers early access to the holiday special collections
• Allow customers to use points and rewards to make purchases
• Allow customers opportunities to donate and give towards charity 
• Make shopping fun by creating bundles, special edits, etc.

8. Focus on the post-purchase experience

The post-purchase experience has become the make or break factor for customer retention. This is true for the holiday and festive season as well. 

Don’t only focus on sales and forget about customers once the transaction is over. Here’s how to make your post-purchase experience better this year:

• Excellent order-tracking via your Shopify customer account page because customers want their festive gifts to reach their loved ones on time
• Don’t make customers check their account every day; send them timely notifications and updates on their orders
• Don’t be like most eCommerce retailers; allow customers to return or exchange products bought from festive sales and win their hearts
• Moreover, make returns and exchanges easy by incorporating a dedicated section/feature in the customer account page

9. Strong checkout strategy 

Shoppers are in a hurry to shop during the festive season as it is a busy time. Moreover, there are too many exciting offers on the internet and it’s easy for them to get distracted.

Hence, ensure your checkout process is easy, fast, and seamless. For example, if you make shoppers fill lengthy sign-up forms, they might lose interest and abandon their carts.

So, what should you do? 

Should you provide a guest checkout option and risk not collecting their contact details? Yes and no.

Here’s how you can ensure the best checkout strategy this holiday season:

• Enable social login. This means customers can quickly login via their social accounts
• Make sign-up process short and easy
• Don’t make sign-up mandatory even though it’s the most beneficial for your business
• Engage guest checkout shoppers on the thank you page; encourage them to sign up for newsletters or notifications

Source

Also read: Is Guest Checkout Doing More Harm To Your BFCM & Holiday Season Sale?

10. Social media 

Shoppers are increasingly turning to social media sites in their search for the ideal presents. Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube, Reddit, among others. 

Additionally, as they become more socially adept, they demand better-quality material and easier purchasing processes via social channels. 

Consider this: traffic referrals from social platforms increased 27% over the previous year in Q1 2023. 75% of shoppers use social media channels to research and find products they want to buy, and will continue to do so for their festive season shopping. You can lean on these trends to maximize returns from your social channels

Do this:

• Create social media marketing and promotional campaigns for the festive season
• Combine features of your Shopify store within the social campaigns 
• Promote social media campaigns on your other channels
• Don’t forget social media ads this festive season

Ready to start your 2023 holiday season promotions?

While you prepare your holiday season marketing plan, you must also pay attention to one of the key aspects of your Shopify site — the customer account page. 

The customer page is where customers will login before making purchases. It is the page they will go to track their orders or initiate returns. It is one of the most important sections of your website that will help you hold your festive campaigns.

And so, you must use a smart customer account page app for Shopify that brings to table all the comprehensive capabilities and functionalities.

Explore Flits Customer Account Page App and install it on your Shopify store today.