It’s that time of year. Sales are about to blow wide open for online stores. Here’s how to best take advantage of all those buyers ready to throw money at you.

1. Create a Landing Page

Make a page with specials on 3-5 products (or 3-5 categories if you sell a wide variety of products). These can be your best sellers or inventory you need to move. Just make sure they’re items that would make great gifts. Small and light items are great since people will be looking for stocking stuffers.

When setting up this page, think about your target market. And think about who would be buying gifts for them. Make sure you’re appealing to that audience. (Hopefully you’ve already created a buyer persona.)

For example, if you sell angora toothbrushes and your target market consists of female managers of vegan grocery stores, make your sales copy appeal to them and the people who hang out with them. You can literally say something like, “These make the perfect gift for vegan grocery store managers.”

Gift givers want to feel like their gift is going to be The One that makes the giftee gasp with delight. Assure them that your products will get their names permanently etched into the Annals of The Most Extraordinary Gift Givers Since the Dawn of Time.

2. Create an Ad

This will be used to drive people to your special landing page on your online store. Pro tip: Ads featuring shiny, happy people almost always outperform ads without people.

So get some images of smiling women using those angora toothbrushes and maybe their smiling boyfriends hanging out in the background. Because who doesn’t spend their tooth brushing time laughing and playing with their significant other?

Okay, nobody does that. But you want to make people think that these toothbrushes are going to turn their boring, grumpy morning routine into happy fun times for everyone.

Put some text on your ad that says something like “Gifts for Vegan Grocery Store Managers.” Then add your offer. For example, “20% off Black Friday only.”

3. Find Influencers

Make sure you find influencers with legit engagement. You should manually check their account and confirm active engagement from their customers (who obviously fit your target market).

Go for folks with followers in the five figures (or 4 figures if you’re on a super tight budget).

Contact them about sharing your ad. Some influencers spell out how to contact them and what their rates are. Others you may need to ask for their rates. Make sure to give them a compelling reason to feature you. Something like this:

Hey Super Awesome Influencer,

I really love your account – especially the post you did about locally-sourced Italian flip-flops. Those were uhmazing!

I think you and your followers might also like my angora toothbrushes. We’re offering a 20% discount for Black Friday. Here’s the ad we’re running. (Insert your awesome ad)

If it seems like a good fit to you, let me know your ad rates. Thanks!

Your Name

Your Website

4. Get Your Fulfillment Process Down Pat

Whether you’re fulfilling orders yourself or outsourcing it, you need to know what each step of the fulfillment process involves and how long it should take. You want to be prepared if your ad blows up and you end up receiving hundreds or even thousands of orders on your online store.

Customers expect emails with order updates nowadays. So make sure you’ve setup email templates for order confirmations (“We’ve received your order and our magic elves are preparing it now”).

You’ll also want to send an email with tracking info once the order has shipped.

5. Make Sure Your Customer Service Game Is On Point

You’re bound to get questions, concerns and return requests from customers. As ByteStand’s Customer Support Magician, I can tell you that providing quick, helpful responses is incredibly important.

Yes, even when customers are yelling at you for destroying their lives with your angora toothbrushes. Remain calm, let their flaming hatred roll off your back, and do what you can to help.

Save time by creating templates or saved responses to the most common questions in advance. That way, when the orders start rolling in, you’ll have more time to focus on fulfillment and counting your money.

Conclusion

This is the time of year to really put your online store out there to maximize sales. People are looking for great gifts. Know who your products appeal to, and then get them in front of those people.

If you’ve got your fulfillment and customer service in place, you’ll find yourself sipping eggnog (or your holiday beverage of choice) in no time.