By Eric Rosenberg
The holiday shopping season traditionally kicks off with Black Friday, the annual shopping holiday the day after Thanksgiving that brings retailers “into the black” for the year, indicating a profitable period. But Black Friday alone is rarely enough to compete and make a profit in today’s market. Instead, many business owners run holiday sales to boost business during the busiest time of the year.
1. Start With the Math
In business, there is a concept of selling some products at a small loss to boost the sales of high margin products. These “loss leaders” can work well to boost the top line, but you can’t run a business with a focus only on revenue. You have to turn a profit to succeed in business.
Do the math and calculate margins on the products you expect to sell the most, and figure how to turn lower margin customers into higher margin customers. If you can upsell, convert, or at least turn low margin customers into leads for high profit products, you should be in great shape.
2. Improve the Customer Experience
Many shoppers try new stores, both online and offline, during the holidays. In fact, the National Retail Federation shares that 27.4 percent of all retail sales took place during the holidays in 2015 and most business expect about 20 percent of sales to come during the holiday season. (more…)
When speech therapist Michelle Lance starting working with the Idaho SBDC in Pocatello, she was working full-time as a speech therapist for a clinic. As she watched management struggle with employee relationships and effective service delivery, she saw ways to better run a clinic.
