Getting ready for the holiday shopping season can be stressful enough for shoppers. But for online shop owners, between running promos, getting your shop ready, setting up ads, and getting your social media posts planned, it can feel downright overwhelming. So we’ve made it a little easier! Instead of having a big glob of “to-dos” piling up so high that you don’t know where to start, we’ve broken it down for you into five things you have to do for a successful holiday season, five things you should do, five things you could do, and five things that will make your shop totally rock. Below you’ll find a nifty little graphic and tips for each item to help you out!

.     .     .

5 THINGS YOU HAVE TO DO

✔️ Tell everyone about FREE SHIPPING: Your customers get free shipping from November 1st to December 15th! Free shipping is a sweet enough deal to mean the difference between a sale and an abandoned cart, so spread the word!

✔️ Plan your promotions and run sales: Think about your sales early and have a plan! Make it easy on yourself by using the Global Pricing Tool to lower all of your prices. And don’t worry – to switch them all back, all you have do is hit the “end the promotion” button!

✔️ Add giftable items and promote: Post about your most giftable items and affordable best sellers to appeal to shoppers looking for stocking stuffers.

✔️ Create a shop update on social media: This is a quick and easy way to set up a Facebook status or tweet, and you don’t even have to leave your Dashboard (although we suggest spicing it up with your own message!)

✔️ Tell customers when to order to get items in time for the holidays: the last thing you want is for last-minute shoppers to get mad that their orders didn’t arrive in time for the holidays. It helps to let them know when the very last day to place an order and receive it in time is! Right now, for US shoppers that’s December 13th – we’ll let you know if that changes!

5 THINGS YOU SHOULD DO

✔️ Update your shop banner: Changing up your shop banner is a great way to spice up your shop, make it festive, and to have information about free shipping and promos.

✔️ Schedule posts for the holidays: this ensures you have plenty of time to get creative, plus it also means you don’t have to be glued to social media during the holidays!

✔️ Set up your About page: As sales trainer Adrian Miller said in Entrepreneur, people buy from those they like and can relate to. Your About page is a way to sell your story and lets customers follow your social media (where they’ll also see your promo posts!)

✔️ Create an interactive social media post: do a poll about your customers’ favorite Christmas movie, post a question like “Do you consider Die Hard a Christmas movie? Like for ‘no’, retweet for ‘yes'”, etc.

✔️ Add and promote a new design, product, or color options: This is a great time to add new products your customers may not have seen and to promote them! Simply adding new color options to existing products (and promoting them as well) is a great way to keep your shop fresh. 

5 THINGS YOU COULD DO

✔️ Order samples from your shop for photos: you get all items from your own shop for just the base cost! Order items that are most relevant to the season and that are most giftable.

✔️ Create a Gift Guide Collection: you can create gift guides right in your shop by creating a temporary gift guide collection, or several collections with different themes; a “Secret Santa Gift Collection” could be items under $25, “Gifts for the Creative” could be a collection featuring zip pouches and notebooks, etc.

✔️ Add some holiday-centric lifestyle photos to your homepage (featuring stocking stuffers): use those samples you ordered to shoot some lifestyle photography with relevant, holiday, gift-giving vibes and feature those photos in your homepage collection! 

✔️ Send an email newsletter: one of the perks of Artist Shops is that you get access to your customers’ emails! Send them an email newsletter with a gift guide, with details about your promos, with a preview at new gift items you’re going to add, etc.! 

✔️ Add a limited time design: this is a great way of building urgency. Let people know that it’s limited time on social media! 

5 THINGS TO MAKE YOUR SHOP TOTALLY ROCK

✔️ Launch a Facebook ad campaign: A little goes a long way with Facebook ads, and putting a little cash behind one during the holiday season is worth it (even just $5!)

✔️ Create GIFs of a few designs: this is a really fun way to promote your designs – check out how artist Metalsan does it! 

✔️ Reach out to an influencer: having a trusted Instagram influencer or blogger talk about your products or designs is an awesome way of tapping into their audience. Do this sooner rather than later, though! Take it from a blogger – they’re already planning their holiday content! (Here are some tips on reaching out.) 

✔️ Do a giveaway: you know all those samples of your own products you ordered (you did that, right?) Use them for a giveaway! A giveaway is a great way to spread the word and gain followers – people love free stuff! 

✔️ Share some WIP images: people want to see how your art comes together – share process sketches or time-lapses with them! 

.     .     .

Featured illustration and graphic by Katie Lukes

Want to start an online business? Try Artist Shops for free!

Related Posts