Competing with the Big Boys on Cyber Monday

I am not sure I will have many visitors here today. Cyber Monday now rivals Black Friday as being the major shopping day of the year. A poll by Zogby found that about three out of four holiday shoppers will do at least part of their shopping on line. So most people on the web today are looking for bargains and many small business owners are busy filling those orders.
A few years back Cyber Monday was the secret world of small, niche-oriented businesses. Not any more. Now small businesses have to compete against national chains looking to keep their share of the holiday shopping.
For example, Walmart now actively promotes their “cyber week”. From CNN/Money.com:

Walmart.com is giving customers another special Christmas gift as it kicks off Cyber Monday with five days of online specials, only available at Walmart.com…. Starting today and through Friday (Nov. 30), Walmart.com is offering significant savings on the season’s best gifts in Electronics, Toys, Video Games, Home Furnishings and Apparel.
Walmart.com has nearly tripled the number of Cyber Week online specials this year since last year, and is adding new items each day this week. Also, the online retailer is introducing a “daily featured item” each day this week for online purchase on that particular day.

So how can small business owners keep their footing and maintain a share of the Cyber Monday bonanza?
Inc.com offers these suggestions:
– Keep your site up to date. Make sure it looks fresh and has the most current information.
– Keep your audience in mind with your website. This goes back to one of my favorite marketing adages — “Think like your customer!”
– Content actually is more important than style. “Most people will put up with a bad design if the content grabs them.” If you are not a good writer, use someone on your staff to write to copy. You may even to best to hire someone to write your copy for you. Such an investment should pay for itself with increased activity from your site.
– Don’t overdue the animation. It can slow down visits to your site and cause people to move on to another site.
There is still time to get your site right for this year. Don’t be fooled by the moniker “Cyber Monday.” It seems that Cyber Monday is more marketing hype than reality. Although it is a busy day for on-line shopping it seems that the busiest time is yet to come. Last year Cyber Mondy ranked as the 12th most busy shopping day on-line. From SignOnSanDiego.com:

The National Retail Foundation wants you to believe in Cyber Monday, a mythical day when office workers across the land let all calls go straight to voice mail to better focus on shopping online.
The real peak in cyber shopping won’t come until the first two weeks of December, when keyboard shoppers realize that shipping rates are about to go up. Last year, the week of Dec. 3 was the biggest week overall for online shopping, while Dec. 12, a Tuesday, was the biggest single day.

Although many of us had our doubts just a few short years ago, cyber shopping is here to stay and is growing rapidly each year. According to comScore, Inc., on-line shopping doubled from 2003 to 2006, growing from $12.3 billion to $24.6 billion. This year is is expected to grow another $5 billion.