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The holiday season is upon us again and for me personally, these months are synonymous with coziness, gifts and being with family and friends. But this year the holidays are going to be different and of course that has everything to do with the outbreak of COVID-19. As things stand, we won’t be able to get together with the whole family or group of friends for St. Nicholas and Christmas, so we’ll have to look for an alternative way to celebrate these days.
On the professional front, the corona outbreak is also creating a challenge; although we’ve also been buying a lot of stuff during the partial lockdown to make sitting and working at home as comfortable as possible, I think the next few weeks are going to cause online consumer spending to surge with days like Singles’ Day, Black Friday and the holidays. People who want to avoid crowded stores and locations will be looking online for things that make life and work at home easier and looking for gifts and other items for St. Nicholas and Christmas.
Be prepared – order in time
Of course, together with the e-commerce sector, we are going to do everything we can to ensure that these online purchases go smoothly, which is why this year we are again launching a campaign in which we, together with webshops and carriers, are calling on consumers to order their holiday packages in time.
Webshop owners can also contribute individually and I would be happy to help you with this. I have a number of tips that can help you relieve the pressure in your store and on the logistics sector:
- Share your sales forecast with the carriers, so they can prepare for it.
- Spread your sales actions and bring them forward.
- Inform customers clearly about the delivery time and do not make promises you cannot keep.
- Encourage your customers with sales promotions to make as many orders at once as possible.
- Give consumers the opportunity to pick up the packages in a store or at a pickup point.
- Try to pack as many orders as possible for the same customer into one package.
- Try to deliver orders to your shipping party by the end of the week and avoid crowds.
- Avoid crowds during the late hours of the day and get your package to the carrier as early in the day as possible.
- Make sure consumers can track their order with Track & Trace.
If we all put our best foot forward, I’m sure we can make this year’s holiday season another success for consumers, online stores and carriers. Even if there are fewer of us this year. I’m sure we can come up with enough ways to make it workable and enjoyable within all the existing and upcoming guidelines and measures.
More tips & tricks for the holiday season from Thuiswinkel.org
