How to prepare for rushed holiday sales season

"The 2012 online holiday shopping season is off to an encouraging start with a 16-percent growth thus far," said comScore Chairman, Gian Fulgoni. "Recent 5-year highs in consumer confidence and early retailer promotions appear to be serving as wind in the sails for the beginning portion of the holiday season, with consumers opening up their wallets early and often. This spending growth also reflects the continuing channel shift to online as consumers increasingly opt for the attractive pricing, convenience and product selection it offers."

While the shoppers are headed online, new data out from SMB DigitalScape indicates small businesses may not be ready for the surge, and might miss out on high sales volume. One of the prime reasons SMBs may miss out - consumers can't find them online. Their data shows 74% don't have location data in website meta titles while 91% have duplicate page issues. Small businesses are also selling themselves short by not optimizing sites for mobile (98% aren't mobile optimized) and not having a social presence.

While it is too late to have a site fully mobile optimized by the end of the Thanksgiving weekend - there are four more weeks of shopping activity. CorraTech suggests brands:

• Have a final meeting to ensure all departments are up to speed on holiday plans
• Run a final website test to ensure websites are working correctly
• Finalize the holiday campaign - and stick with that campaign

Tags: 2012 holiday tips, 2012 holiday trends, comScore, CorraTech, ecommerce, online shopping, SMB DigitalScape