The way shoppers buy at peak online spending seasons, such as Christmas, is changing, an InternetRetailing report has found.
Shoppers are buying closer to the date, as fufillment methods improves, while they are also carrying out ever more research online before they buy, the Seasonal Peaks Research Report found. That all has implications for the way retailers plan. Chris Haighton, head of supplier management at Shop Direct , told researchers: “Every year our capabilities improve, however the challenges also become harder each year as peaks become higher and sharper and as customer expectation of our ability to fulfil an order placed at the last minute grows and grows.”
The study also found that planning for seasonal peaks goes well beyond Christmas. While this was the most important peak for 73% of the retailers surveyed, 16% said Easter was most important. Asked for their second-most important annual peak time, 32% cited back-to- school.
Find out more about the challenges of seasonality, and how to plan for them, by downloading the research report.
Meanwhile, the strengths and weakness of the retail customer experience, from the website to in-store and on mobile, are analysed in the InternetRetailing Customer Experience research report.
