On Monday we talked about the survey we co-sponsored about holiday expectations. Another notable statistic is worth commenting on: 48% of respondents will present ‘limited time offers’ to customers as a means for attracting customers this holiday season. I have always believed that the #1 key to online conversion is presenting the right offer to the right person at the right time.  People are looking for something online (either explicitly, or just browsing, looking for something that strikes them), and if you can present them with something that is what they want, they’ll buy it. If that offer is also what you most want to sell them, it’s a win-win (that’s the principle behind “searchandising”).

The interesting question to me is the balance (or tension) between an offer that fulfills a quest, and an offer that is just a good deal. To what extent will people buy something just because it is on sale, when they would not have been interested at all if it was not on sale? And importantly, does that behavior differ online from in-store? If the goal is to maintain loyalty among customers for the long-term, is the ‘limited time offer’ antiquated? Will savvier retailers improve their margins by replacing gimmicks with searchandising? Most would agree that the challenges facing online sellers versus brick and mortar are quite different—the blowout sale might still be effective on both, because everyone likes cheap goods (so long as the quality isn’t cheap), but a large part of why Black Friday exists is because of perfectly practical circumstance. Most people have the day off from work, so it’s a great day to spend time shopping. The fact that the retail world recognized this and offered promotions around it works wonders. But people don’t need a day off to shop online. In fact, more people probably shop at work or before bed than actually spend a day off sitting at their computer desk. So it makes sense that online traffic would surge during gift-buying season…but it also makes sense to enhance your site with easier site navigation and more customized merchandising than to simply entice one-time shoppers with the promise of 10% off.