Holiday Ecommerce Readiness: A 17-Point Checklist to Prepare for Peak Season

Make sure you’ve got all bases covered with this holiday ecommerce readiness checklist.

The final few months of the year are full of pressure. Not only are you pushing to meet year-end goals, but you’re dealing with unprecedented demand. 

Ecommerce sales spike during the final quarter thanks to online shopping events like Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and Christmas, and this exciting buzz around the holiday season is compounding each year. Research from Digital Commerce found that last year’s online holiday sales increased by 4.9% year-on-year, with shoppers spending a collective $221.1 billion in November and December of 2023—and this year is set to be one of the biggest on record.

To capitalize on this increase in holiday ecommerce consumer spend, you need to be prepared in advance. 

Your ecommerce platform needs to run like a well-oiled machine to prevent downtime or outages, and the customer experience needs to be world-class throughout each stage of the conversion funnel if you’re to stand any chance at prying attention away from deal-promising competitors. This guide will ensure you’ve got all bases covered with a holiday ecommerce readiness checklist.

Prepare and optimize your site

Improve your site speed

You’ve done the hard work of prying attention from competitors’ holiday campaigns and driving traffic toward your ecommerce site. Don’t fall at the final hurdle by offering a sluggish user experience. Just a half-second improvement in site speed has been proven to increase conversion rate drastically.

Before making any changes to your site in the run up to peak season, run your ecommerce site’s URL through our Site Speed Audit. This free Shopify tool will show how long your site loads on different devices and compares it to other businesses of a similar size in the same industry. It’s a good benchmark to judge whether improvements to site speed are a dire priority when resources are already stretched. 

Our Site Speed Audit will also provide personalized recommendations on how to improve your site speed, based on the data it collects. For example, that might be:

• Removing unnecessary popups
• Compressing images
• Minifying code
• Using lite embeds for video
• Building Accelerated Mobile Pages

Most Shopify stores are already faster than you think. Our investments into ecommerce infrastructure mean Shopify’s site speed is, on average, 1.2 seconds faster compared to competitors. Shopify has the fastest server speed in commerce too—up to 3.9 times faster than comparable platforms.

Shopify is faster than comparable ecommerce platforms.

Dermalogica is just one of the millions of brands that have switched to Shopify and saw considerable improvements to their site speed. Their previous platform, Salesforce Commerce Cloud, didn’t allow for extensive customization. Any expansions into overseas territories was also complex and tedious to configure.

The skincare brand migrated to Shopifyin a bid to improve the online shopping experience and streamline internal processes when customizing their ecommerce store. They saw an impressive 41% jump in site speed within the first month, and sales increased as a result too. Dermalogica experienced a 119% uplift in conversion rate contributing to 119% more sales.

Check mobile readiness

Mobile devices accounted for more than half of all online sales throughout the last Black Friday Cyber Monday weekend—a 10.4% increase from the year prior. This shift toward mobile shopping echoes what we see at other points of the year, further reinforcing the need to be mobile-friendly.

Simply designing a responsive website isn’t enough. Mobile shoppers have completely different shopping experiences when they’re interacting with an ecommerce site on a smaller screen, so put some thought into mobile-first design principles that treat these shoppers as a priority rather than an afterthought. That means:

• Using large, finger-friendly buttons
• Stacking navigation menus 
• Using image carousels
• Preventing auto-play on videos
• Improving mobile site speed

Optimize your checkout

Cart abandonment is a year-round concern that’s especially prevalent during the holiday shopping season. A quarter of holiday shoppers say they’re looking for good deals. A well-optimized checkout can convince them to buy from your website, rather than exit in search of an alternative.

Simple ways to optimize the checkout experience for holiday shoppers include:

• Enabling guest checkout 
• Upgrade to checkout extensibility
• Offering one-click checkout with apps like Shop Pay
• Showcasing social proof
• Upselling or cross-selling related products

Don’t limit your checkout optimization to the checkout page itself. Think about the experience you’re offering as soon as somebody sees the “Order confirmed” message. It’s the perfect place to continue a new shopper’s enthusiasm and build their excitement for a product that’ll soon be in their hands. 

Everlane optimized their checkout with Shopify.

Shopify businesses can benefit from the years of testing we’ve already done on checkout optimization. At its core, Shopify’s checkout can boost conversions up to 50% more than traditional guest checkout, and outperform other accelerated checkouts by at least 10%. 

Everlane is one brand that switched from a previously complex checkout to Shopify. As product lead Anna M. Peterson says, “Our self-built ecommerce platform was overly focused on solving standard industry problems like currency conversion and tax calculations.” 

Everlane chose Shopify because they wanted to make the checkout experience a fuss-free journey for shoppers. “We didn’t want our customers to continue having to enter their address or credit card information, or spend time making an account,” Anna says. “Most people want to avoid signing up and giving you their password. We wanted to make it seamless and easy for them to purchase quickly.”

It’s a move that quickly paid off for the brand. Everlane reached record highs in checkout conversion rates, capturing 15% of their audience within the first 30 days of offering Shop Pay. Anna adds: “Our customers are using Shop Pay, and it resonates well with them. They recognize the Shop Pay button on our site from other places they’ve shopped before.”

Lean on automations

Holiday season can feel like a scramble, even for the seemingly most organized brands. You might have your ducks in a row for the first few months of the year, but when Black Friday Cyber Monday weekend hits, all hell seems to break loose. You’re dealing with more shoppers, orders, and website traffic than ever before.

Automation helps you stretch limited resources without having to hire seasonal staff. Shopify Flow, for example, could automate repetitive tasks throughout the Black Friday Cyber Monday weekend like:

• Segmenting holiday shoppers
• Pausing holiday marketing campaigns for out-of-stock products
• Checking high-risk transactions for fraud
• Sending handwritten notes to high value customers
• Flagging or blocking serial refunders 

The benefits of automation span beyond time savings. When businesses use automation, human error—like accidentally sending a handwritten message addressed to the wrong customer—are cut dramatically. This in turn improves the customer experience and has a long-standing positive impact on revenue. 

Example Shopify Flow automation that hides out-of-stock products.

Prepare your inventory and logistics

Supply chain management

Demand surges during peak shopping season, leaving you at risk of stockouts that collectively cost businesses $350 billion each year.

A stockpile of cash is the simplest way to mitigate risk, particularly if you’re anticipating a bigger sales event than years prior. You can use a lump sum to quickly reorder new inventory if a particular SKU is selling faster than expected, diversify your supplier base, or try alternative transportation methods to quickly deliver items to your customers when your existing partners are overloaded. 

Pashion Footwear experienced this issue firsthand during last year’s Black Friday Cyber Monday weekend. Founder Haley Pavone turned to Shopify Capital as a way to secure funding without giving away equity in her business or relinquishing control over how the money could be spent. 

Once the funds from Shopify Capital landed in her account, Haley used the majority of the business’s funds to airship inventory instead of relying on water shipping (which is traditionally much slower).

“I'm not confident we would have been able to bring in our holiday shipment [without Shopify Capital],” said founder Haley Pavone. “Capital was vital in getting us the holiday inventory on hand that we needed to support that 375% sales growth. I don’t think we would have seen anything close to that growth figure without it.” 

Expand to new markets and regions

Global commerce is growing at a rapid rate. The accessibility of an online store allows businesses to sell to anyone, anywhere. Data compiled on Shopify stores last Black Friday Cyber Monday showed that 15% of all orders were cross-border. That isn’t set to change throughout this year’s holiday season.

That said, there are some obstacles you’ll need to iron out when expanding internationally during the Black Friday Cyber Monday weekend, like complying with local laws, taxes, and duty requirements. The last thing you want is to start accepting overseas orders and figure out the legal and compliance aspect while a customer is waiting for their order.

Shopify Managed Markets has everything you need to take the hassle out of global commerce. It’s helped brands like WOLFpak increase Black Friday Cyber Monday sales by 528% year-over-year thanks to their partnership with Global-e, which becomes the merchant of record. They take responsibility for accepting local payment methods, remitting taxes, and organizing international shipping and fulfillment. 

Managed Markets can take care of all five challenges.

Review your fulfillment options

Speaking of fulfillment, the holiday season can sabotage even the most well-oiled fulfillment machines. Shipping carriers often get overloaded with the sheer volume of parcels they have to deliver. A sudden influx in orders can also impact fulfillment times as you don’t have the resources required to pick, pack, and ship many more orders using your current warehousing facilities.

There are two options to consider here—both of which should be arranged with plenty of time to test the new ecommerce holiday strategy prior to an uplift in order volume:

• Work with temporary third-party logistics providers (3PL): Outsourcing fulfillment to a 3PL reassigns the responsibility of storing inventory and fulfilling orders. Whenever a new order comes through your ecommerce site, you can route it to a 3PL service that will pick, pack, and ship it to your customer.
• Create new or temporary shipping partners: Diversify your shipping partners to deliver on your fast shipping promises. Even if one partner is overrun with orders and is struggling to commit to delivery speeds, you can rely on another partner that isn’t experiencing the same issue.

Review your holiday shipping policy

Free shipping isn’t a competitive advantage—it’s become the norm. Per Statista, 8 out of 10 online shoppers consider it important in their purchase decisions. Failing to offer it throughout the holiday season, a time where almost every retailer offers some kind of shipping promotion, could cause you to lose customers.

Free shipping aside, spend some time examining your shipping policy for things like:

• Free shipping thresholds: Keep holiday orders profitable by requiring customers to meet a minimum spend to qualify for free shipping. 
• Guaranteed delivery cutoffs: If you’re promoting Christmas gifts but shipping delays mean their item takes five days to arrive, for example, a cutoff of December 15 would limit unhappy customers who complain about post-holiday deliveries while also giving you time to chase any late deliveries before the big day.
• Shipping rate adjustments: If you’re outsourcing fulfillment to a 3PL, absorb the additional fees into your shipping rates.

Review your holiday returns policy

Ecommerce retailers receive the most returns in December, January, and February. Reasons range from the intended recipient not liking their gift, or the shopper reclaiming money they’ve overspent in a holiday-inspired splurge.

Before heading into the holiday season, make sure you’re setting clear customer expectations on what products people can return, when, and how. Review your returns policy to check for things like:

• Cost of returns: Charging holiday shoppers to return their order, like paying for their own shipping label, could deter them from sending their products back. 
• Return options: Do all shoppers need to post their return to your storage facility, or can they alleviate pressure on your warehousing team by returning it in-store?
• Exchange options: If you don’t want to extend the returns period and give back money you earned up to three months prior, offer exchanges or gift cards in lieu of a cash refund. 
• Return processing expectations: You might find it difficult to stick to a three-day window of approving returns if your warehouse is processing a larger volume than usual. 

Some retailers extend their returns policy over the holiday season to account for these extra returns. While it might sound counterintuitive (a 30-day returns window for an item bought in November would be non-returnable by Christmas), it could sabotage the returns experience for your customers and deter them from returning in the future. 

Review curbside pickup and BOPIS policies

Ecommerce brands with a network of retail stores are at an added advantage during peak shopping seasons because you can treat each location as a mini fulfillment hub. You can spread out resources and avoid overwhelming your central distribution center with a sudden influx of orders.

Customers can also opt for local pickup options, such as curbside pickup or buy online, pick up in-store (BOPIS) to get their order faster. There’s no need to wait for their parcel to arrive (and potentially contend with shipping delays). Holiday shoppers can collect their order for free by visiting your store.

Improve the customer experience

Set expectations for longer delivery and return policy windows

If you were to order something exciting online and were told it’d arrive in two days, you’d be eagerly anticipating the delivery truck. Being told on the day that the delivery is later than expected would cause frustration, especially if you’ve scheduled your day around the carrier’s estimated delivery time.

Shoppers are having similar experiences when they buy from brands online, and they’re not afraid to complain when their expectations are unmet. That’s why it’s much better to overestimate your delivery times and surprise customers if you’re able to deliver sooner, as opposed to getting their hopes up and ultimately letting them down.

Shop Promise helps you show these delivery expectations before a customer places their order. The badge uses your order fulfillment history and reliable transit time estimations to determine an expected delivery date. If you fail to meet this promise on eligible transactions, the shopper could receive Shop Cash by way of an apology.

“With Shop Promise, new customers are incentivized to purchase when they see the fast shipping promise on our site and it's helped us reduce the number of support tickets due to order issues,” says Kamyln S., customer service manager at Von D Shoes.

Shop App’s delivery promise for a holiday order.

Ramp up customer support

A surge in customers and website traffic undoubtedly means a surge in support or customer service tickets. Website visitors might need a helping hand finding the right gift for a recipient, and pressure to have items delivered by a certain date can also make customers antsy.

Before the busy holiday season arrives, prepare your ecommerce business by:

• Creating self-serve documentation: Divert customers to help guides that they can access independently without asking for help from your support team.
• Leaning on technology: Whether it’s a customer relationship management (CRM) tool or an automated helpdesk, technology allows your customer service team to handle more tickets by freeing up time they’d otherwise spend on manual tasks like information retrieval.
• Being proactive: Instead of letting customers grow more frustrated by forcing them to find a resolution themselves, be proactive with your approach. For example, an email check-in 14 days after purchase is the perfect time to ask whether there’s anything they need assistance with (and to leave a positive review if not).

Consider an unboxing experience

An unboxing experience is likely the last thing on your mind when you’re stretching resources to fulfill a surge in orders. You want to get each order out of the door as soon as possible. But spending some time refining the appearance and appeal of your packages could influence how likely a customer is to share it by way of word-of-mouth.

A delightful unboxing experience can create a ton of free user-generated content (UGC) to use in future marketing campaigns—like this TikTok video from creator Brooke Lynn, who shows what it’s like to unbox a package from luggage brand BÉIS. 

People who hear the creator’s experience, including the thoughts she was having prior to purchasing, have the opportunity to see themselves in a customer’s shoes. This alone can create an experience that can tempt followers into buying.

Create strategic holiday marketing and promotions

Consider flash sales or holiday discounts

With some brands offering up to 56% off their full priced products during the holiday season, it’s no wonder why Black Friday Cyber Monday has become the busiest shopping season of the year. Customers are conditioned to shop to capitalize on holiday deals they won’t find for another 12 months.

Popular discounting strategies during the holiday season include:

• Percentage discounts 
• Early bird discounts 
• Buy one, get one free
• Free shipping 
• Free holiday gifts 

If you’re concerned about discounts eating into your profits at an already-stretched time of year, consider alternative incentives—like a $10 gift card to redeem next year. This is a smart way to encourage repeat purchases and sustain your holiday season success into the months ahead.

A holiday marketing calendar is your secret weapon to staying organized with any sales or discounts. By jotting down key dates throughout the year, you can plan holiday campaigns in advance, give yourself plenty of time to create promotional materials, and ensure that messaging doesn’t overlap. 

Create product bundles

Product bundles help retailers increase their average order value by combining multiple products in a single bundle. Customers buy the bundle at a discounted price, but kitting means multiple items can be sent in a single package. There’s no need to pay for multiple shipping boxes, materials, or postage labels when customers buy a bundle.

When creating a bundle for holiday shoppers, consult your ecommerce data to see which items tend to be bought together. Package them together to proactively suggest the bundle to customers who’d otherwise need to make the decision to buy two products individually (each at full price).

Herschel Supply Company’s product bundle for Black Friday. Source: Really Good Emails.

Create VIP customer offers

It’s not safe to assume that people who’ve bought from your ecommerce site outside of the holiday season will return. Competitors try to pry loyal customers away from their favorite brands with discounts. And it works: people are twice as likely to buy a product with a 20% discount than none at all.

Keep customers coming back to you by offering exclusive flash sales for your VIP customers. To define who these are, consider:

• How many purchases they’ve made—and how frequently those are
• The total amount they’ve spent with you
• How long they’ve been a customer for

The deals you’re offering to repeat customers should be bigger and better than those you’re providing to first-time customers. If you’re giving 20% off to everyone, repeat customers are likely to feel more valued if they know they can get an extra 10% just for being loyal.

Again, if discounting is an issue, reward repeat customers with non-financial rewards, such as early access to new products or bonus loyalty rewards. It still feels like special treatment because they’re capitalizing on offers that are only available to a select few.

Expand your holiday sales channels

Your online storefront is your business’s hub. It’s where customers can get the full branded experience while buying directly from the source, and you can collect customer data for future retargeting. 

That said, not all online sales happen through ecommerce websites. Popular sales channels to meet customers on during the holiday season include:

• Shopping apps like Shop
• Social media platforms
• Marketplaces

Set up processes aside, you’ll need a marketing strategy that builds audiences on these channels if you’re to stand any chance at acquiring customers through them.

Shopify Audiences can help you acquire new customers through these sales channels without investing hours into building custom audiences. The tool generates audience lists based on data collected from Shopify stores to identify people most likely to buy from you. Upload these lists to Meta, Google, TikTok, or Shop Campaigns to run campaigns that convert these potential buyers.

Shopify Audiences has been proven to cut customer acquisition costs by up to 50% and increase retargeting conversions by as much as 2x—with the potential for more throughout the holiday season when social commerce ramps up.

Prepare your ecommerce business for the holiday rush

Peak season is a stressful time for any ecommerce business. Trends show that demand increases every year, and as your audience has grown in the year since, there’s no telling how much traffic and customers you’ll serve over this year’s holiday season.

There’s no better time to plan than now. Use this checklist as a foundation to cover all bases. That way, you can push forward into the holiday season confident that you’re delivering incredible customer experiences and operating as effectively as possible. 

FAQ on ecommerce holiday readiness

What is the meaning of holiday readiness?

Holiday readiness is the process of preparing your ecommerce website for the holiday season. Sales jump up between Thanksgiving and the New Year. “Readiness” simply means preparing your website, automations, marketing campaigns, and resources in advance.

How much does online shopping increase during the holidays?

The holiday season is home to some of the busiest shopping days of the year, including Cyber Monday. Global sales during the five days between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday totalled $254 billion—a substantial chunk of the $5.8 trillion that customers spend year-round.

What are the best months for ecommerce?

October, November, and December are the best months for ecommerce because they include holidays like Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and Christmas. Shoppers spend a collective $283 billion in these three months.

What is the slowest month for ecommerce?

Sales in the first few months of the calendar year tend to be the slowest. Some shoppers have overspent during the months prior on events like Black Friday and Cyber Monday. That, combined with the New Year’s resolution to save money impacts consumer spending.