If you don’t have products that are a natural fit for the summertime, there are still things you can do to boost sales during the slower months. Here we’ll explain five ways you can beat the summer slump.

#1 Make your website mobile-friendly

Everyone dislikes slow websites. Shopping cart abandonment is the bane of ecommerce stores everywhere. In fact, studies show that between 50-70% of people (or higher) abandon their cart in certain industries.

– Slow sites convert a lot less than quick ones. Use fewer pop-ups, enable file compression, and reduce image sizes to shave some milliseconds off your website’s load time

– Try experimenting with tweaks to your mobile website and see if it changes how customers respond.

– Use Google Optimise to run tests to see what people find more appealing.

– See our guide on using mobile commerce to grow your business.

With some trial and error, these tests can help you increase conversions, time on site, and other metrics that can boost your sales. And any improvement you can make to reduce shopping cart abandonment will bolster your bottom line.

“Your homepage must have a strong hook to entice customers and encourage them to shop,” says Brandon Wilkes, marketing manager for expert e-tailer The Big Phone Store. “Increase the impact of your value proposition by succinctly stating the benefits of your products. Using this, you can state your unique selling point (USP) and reflect your brand’s personality.”

#2 Start chatting with your customers

Who doesn’t love a good chat? Messaging apps, chatbots, live representatives, and voice assistants can help you sell. The cool thing about using these is that they allow you to have conversations with your customers instead of talking at them.

This is called conversational commerce. Being responsive and helping to address any queries quickly can help give shoppers the confidence to buy, increasing conversions. And even if these conversations don’t lead to a sale, you’ve probably learned something about your customers along the way. After all, building personalised relationships with your customers is never a bad thing.

#3 Stay on top of your stock

Here’s another helpful thing to do ahead of summer: take stock of your stock. By the time June rolls around, you may have some spring or winter inventory that didn’t sell as well as you’d hoped. That’s less than ideal because:

– Having too much stock creates costs around storage, breakage, and even taxes.

– It takes up valuable space for in-season products and potentially higher-value goods.

– Your inventory forecasting (how you plan your stock) may need to be reviewed.

By sorting your stock before summer, you’re not dealing with it in the busier parts of the year. Run flash sales to shift any excess products. You may not be getting full price, but revenue is revenue, and you’re making room for better stock in the process.

#4 Review your shipping setup

You might also want to check your shipping and service fees and make sure customers aren’t being surprised. A summer shakeup might get otherwise reluctant shoppers over the line.

– Shipping costs were the leading cause of shopping cart abandonment, behind fees and taxes, according to a 2022 study of more than 4,000 shoppers.

– Offering free shipping is a solution. You can limit your costs around free shipping by offering product bundles or embedding shipping costs into the total product price.

– If you can’t offer free shipping, consider offering discounts or other incentives that shoppers perceive as offsetting shipping rates.

#5 Start selling across borders

Going international is another way to beat the summer slump. It’s not summer everywhere in the world at the same time, and cross-border commerce can be a great way to shift products that are out-of-season in your home market to shoppers where they are in season. A Visa GME study found that 87% of ecommerce executives see cross-border sales as one of their biggest future growth drivers.

If you are thinking of going international (or even looking to refine what you do), then check out our cross-border payments guide to excel in new markets.