As you prepare for Cyber Monday, we want to provide you with as much information as possible to get you ready. So we thought - what could be better than hearing from those who have been on the frontlines during the busiest online shopping day of the year?
I wanted to highlight some small tweaks and additions we brought to you in October. Hopefully they make your life a little better as you use Olark!
The following is an excerpt from The Cyber Monday Survival Manual.
When Cyber Monday has come and gone, you're going to want to know how well your team did.
One way to tell is to manually count the number of times someone rings the "official" Cyber Monday Sales Cowbell. (If you got our Survival Kits you know what I mean).
Another more accurate and efficient way would be to have Google Analytics keep track of the numbers for you.
The following is an excerpt from The Cyber Monday Survival Manual.
It's that time of year again - the holiday shopping season is here. That means Cyber Monday is right around the corner.
It's okay to be selfish with your live chat data. Yes, it's great to help your customers, but you should be asking, "What can these customer conversations do for me?"
That's what we started doing about six months ago and it's been a huge benefit to our company in the way we're developing strategic partnerships.
People sometimes ask - what would you do differently if you had to start another company all over again?
We've talked about hiring the right people for your team, but what does it take to ensure your new hires are successful within your organization?
Last year, sales on Cyber Monday topped two billion dollars. That was an 8.5 percent increase from 2013 as Cyber Monday was, again, the busiest day of the year for online shopping. We saw it on our network too. Chats for Olark customers went up 40 percent on the Monday after Thanksgiving, and those numbers stayed high for the week following Cyber Monday.
November and December - the holiday shopping season - will account for 20 to 40 percent of annual sales for small and mid-size businesses.
How are you getting ready?
Onboarding new employees starts with hiring the right people. As part of our continuing series, October is for Onboarding (#October4Onboarding), Kara Silverman of acast tells us how her team uncovers talent that best fits their culture.
If I told you October is the best month for retailers and eCommerce shops to onboard new operators for live chat...would you say that's insane?
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True, the timing is a little crazy - we're less than two months out from the start of the holiday shopping season.
[FURTHER READING: 4 predictions for the 2015 holiday shopping season, via Practical eCommerce]
Yet at the end of last year we did an informal poll of retailers (Retail Lessons for 2015) and when asked what they'd do differently for the holiday rush, many retailers said they would have added more operators on live chat: