10 Digital Analytic Tracking Tips to take based on 2020 Holiday Shopping Trends

In the past e-commerce and retailers performed different roles in the customer shopping journey. This holiday season these two worlds have converged.  An increased attention on health and safety, along with monetary concerns, resulted in a shift in the way consumers spend their holiday budget.

This year online holiday shopping saw a 20% increase in online sales on Thanksgiving to hit $6.8 billion in the US, and a 27% growth to $30.4 billion worldwide, according to data from Salesforce.

Many retailers offered deals earlier than normal to alleviate the strain of providing a large amount of online orders at once when the pandemic put a strain on retailers’ and shipping companies’ fulfillment systems.

Data shows shoppers took advantage of early deals.  Online sales grew 72% year over year on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving and grew 48% the next day on Wednesday, according to Salesforce data.  Some of the most popular shopping categories were computers (marked down 30% on average), toys (20% discount), appliances (21%) and electronics (26%).

Additional retail trends to note from this year’s online holiday shopping season:

• Covid 19 is driving a dramatic increase in the number of consumers who are doing holiday shopping online instead of a brick-and-mortar location.
• Shoppers are spending more time with online content, providing new opportunities for advertisers to connect with them.
• Since less people are traveling during the holidays this year, traffic and purchases from desktops is strong. On Thanksgiving, mobile comprised 58% of orders, but desktop traffic saw two times higher conversion rate. Desktop purchases had a 20% higher average order value on Thanksgiving than mobile purchases, according to Salesforce.
• Contactless shopping options are alleviating consumers concerns about health and safety when shopping in person. Throughout the remainder of the holiday season, we expect to see curbside pickup to gain even more momentum as shoppers avoid crowds and potential shipping delays.

Retailers must focus on addressing customer service issues quickly, particularly with the increase in online shopping. Improvements to e-commerce or mobile capabilities, as well as curbside pickup and returns will help attract shoppers. Providing an optimized, seamless digital customer experience that will provide retailers with the advantage needed to be successful this holiday season. 

Below are ten suggestions on ways you can use digital analytics to improve measurement of your online holiday ecommerce performance:

1. Setup clear goals and KPIs by product categories, audiences, promotions, and campaign sources
2. Analyze conversions in your top line metrics by all segment combinations based on KPIs
3. Don’t settle for daily reporting, establish tracking based on real time data
4. Set up alerts to be able to react to spikes and drops in activity immediately
5. Monitor key struggle analytic factors impacting conversions (e.g. rage clicks, performance, error conditions, repetitive user behavior patterns)
6. Tightly couple traditional web analytic data with digital customer experience data, so you can link user behavior patterns to site KPIs
7. Use heatmaps for quick analysis of user engagement on key entry pages on daily basis broken out by specific campaigns and promotions
8. Track conversions and struggle factors by payment option in real time, payment struggle factors have very direct impact on overall ecommerce conversions
9. Analyze customer experience analytic data, based on shipping and pickup options (curbside pickup, home delivery service, traditional shipping options, and shipping costs)
10. If you have mobile apps, leverage digital experience analytics to monitor customer behavior.  Incorporate journey mapping to link user behavior between mobile apps and website.

Digital Analytics Complimentary Consultation

Pereion Solutions wishes you a prosperous and profitable holiday season.  Let us assist you in achieving greater insight to help improve digital experience through our deep expertise in Customer Experience Analytics.  Please click here to request a complimentary consultation with us to discuss your web analytics and customer experience analytics requirements to ensure you are getting the most value out of your customer experience investment this holiday season.