Both online retailers and shoppers wait with great anticipation for these sacred two days to roll around, and for very good reason; Black Friday and Cyber Monday are two of the biggest online shopping days of the year and as a retailer, you do not want to disappoint!  On the flip side, as a shopper, you do not want to be disappointed! The expectations are huge. What kind of promotions have you got up your sleeve? How will you compete with all of the retailers who will be aggressively marketing their websites? The answer is really simple: By advertising offers that are too good to pass up! Below are just a few of the most popular tried and true offers that statistically perform well year after year.

HINT: Be sure to include coupon codes in your ad copy. They work wonders in terms of tracking which ads/offers performed best.

Exclusive Time Sensitive Promos. Sort of like an “early bird gets the worm” deal. For example: 6 am to noon special savings. Most retailers make these the biggest offers of the day. Be sure to specify time zones.

Free Shipping. This one is a biggie, perhaps the biggest and shoppers have come to expect it. If you do not offer it year round you should definitely do so for Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Sales will likely be lost otherwise.

Site Wide Discounts. Also a big one and very common. It gives your shoppers the freedom to purchase whatever they want and receive a nice savings.

Free Gift with Purchase. A great incentive - especially around the holidays. Shoppers are getting another gift they can either keep for themselves (if they are greedy, ha ha) or give to someone else.

Free Gift Wrap. Shoppers love this. Gift wrapping can be tedious and cumbersome and many wait until the night before to get it all done. This way – they get their gift shipped and wrapped. What could be better?

Take advantage of these two huge shopping days and capitalize on the increase in traffic and sales. Happy Holidays!

Seriously. Why? At the risk of sounding pushy, I can not see any valid reason for not “reaching out” to the visitors who arrived at your site, but failed to take whichever action step you were hoping for. As an example, ecommerce websites obviously want their visitors to complete a sale; while the goal of a lead generation website is for visitors to request more information (i.e. download a whitepaper or sign up for a newsletter) and ultimately capture an email address.

You have more than likely been remarketed to many times and have not even realized. Case in point: it is no mistake that you searched for a portable DVD player and then later that same day (and the entire week thereafter) kept seeing random banner ads from the very same online store you visited that day. If this online retailer is playing their cards right, the banners actually show a DVD player and even better, an enticing discount to lure you back to the site and complete your transaction.

There are so many reasons why visitors do not convert on their first visit. Perhaps they are on their lunch break and ran out of time before they were able to complete their transaction. Maybe they just want to shop around and make sure they are getting the best possible deal. Sometimes it’s as simple as they got distracted and forgot to finish filling out the form on your site or buying the DVD Player and all they need is a friendly reminder (hence remarketing) to visit your site again.

Whatever your online marketing strategy may already include, if you have not engaged in a Remarketing Campaign, you are missing out on great deal opportunities, especially with the holiday season fast approaching.

Clients will often indicate that their online marketing efforts are in good shape because they have a Search Engine Optimization Strategy in place. Or some will say they‘re all set since they are involved in a Pay per Click program with Google AdWords. Some may actually tell me they don’t need to do either and that all of their business comes from word of mouth.

The best case scenario is to truly cover all of your bases and the only way to do that is by engaging in all components of online marketing. This can be a daunting task, given the fact that there are so many options available today. I’d suggest starting out with baby steps and then broadening your efforts slowly, but surely. Below are just a few of the most commonly utilized forms of online marketing initiatives to take into consideration:

Search Engine Optimization (frequently referred to as SEO)
According to Wikipedia’s definition, Search Engine Optimization is the process of improving the visibility of a website or a web page in search engines via the “natural” or un-paid (”organic” or “algorithmic”) search results.  Clients love achieving high organic rankings in the search engines. This is especially true when it comes to Google, which is no surprise considering it holds about 65% of the market share. Remember: organic rankings equate to FREE traffic.

Pay per Click (also known as PPC)
In this platform the advertiser is paying or bidding on keywords based on their specific business or industry, in an effort to have their ad displayed in the sponsored section of the search engine. This section is typically on the very top of the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) as well as on the right hand side, listed vertically.

Onsite Blog + Blog Postings 
In my opinion, having an onsite blog is no longer an option, but rather a necessity. The main reason it ought to be onsite versus offsite is for the SEO benefits your website will gain. Blogs should have fresh and regular content on them, which the search engines love when crawling. You will want to ensure that your blog is updated on a regular basis (minimum of once a week).

Mobile Website
Nearly everyone has a Smartphone or iPad these days and more often that not, most are surfing the web via their device. You ought to make sure that you have a simplistic, mobile friendly version of your website that allows for easy navigation.
Social Media Marketing + Strategy
This form of marketing has become increasingly important the last few years and continues to maintain its necessary place within a marketer’s ad budget. Social Media is an excellent medium to reach and engage your consumers and should be utilized to its fullest potential. Just having a Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn page is not enough, however. You must have a solid strategy in place before diving in.