4 Ways to Beat Amazon at Its Own Game This Holiday Season

Boost Your Brand

The end of summer is near, and that means that the holiday shopping season is right around the corner. Numerous studies project it's going to be the busiest online shopping season ever, and if a recent forecast from NetElixir is any indication, it’s critical to ensure your brand’s website and e-commerce app is ready to handle the craziness.According to NetElixir’s 2017 Holiday Forecast, e-commerce sales will experience a 10% spike in the coming months, and it’s driven by three forces, including Amazon’s growing user base paired with Prime Day shopping, more affordable price points online, and a general drop in brick-and-mortar sales and more physical retail locations close.“This year, we have seen an overall sales slowdown and retail drop with more store closings,” NetElixir wrote in a news release. “We compared this year’s revenues, orders and average order value (AOV) for our clients to last year’s. We saw a significant drop for all of these with revenues down 10%, orders down 9% and AOV down 1%.”Meanwhile, the forecast anticipates Amazon to continue controlling the lion’s share of online sales with 34% of total sales compared to 30% in 2016. The prospect of competing with an online retail giant like Amazon may seem like a daunting task, but luckily Kissmetrics has a few words of advice to help David slay Goliath.

1. Find your nicheAmazon is a go-to option for a growing share of consumers because it’s a catch-all shopping experience. However, as more consumers start to prefer specialized treatment, you can share your expertise and establish your niche.
2. Revolutionize your shippingPrime is a huge selling point of the Amazon experience. You might think it would be too difficult and costly to compete with free two-day shipping on all orders, but companies like Zappos have found a way to exceed customers’ expectations.
3. Let users subscribeCustomers love perks, and Amazon has plenty of them. Creating a subscription service that allows customers to receive deals, discounts, newsletters, and other content relevant to your business is a great way to build brand loyalty.
4. Improve customer serviceCustomer service is Amazon’s Achilles heel. That’s not to say they’re bad at it, but they’re just too big to do it as well as you can. Provide personalized one-on-one service to your customers and there’s no need to over-complicate it.