Cyber Monday Without a Sale

Monday, and no sale

Today is Cyber Monday. Inboxes are full of discounts, and people who spent the weekend shopping are still at it, now often on their phones.

Some small stores decided not to join in. Their prices are set fairly all year, their margins cannot carry a deep cut, or they do not want to teach customers to wait for a sale.

That is a reasonable decision. Saying nothing at all today is a different decision, and usually a worse one, because people are buying gifts this week whether or not you discount.

A reason that is not the price

A discount is one answer to the question every shopper asks: why buy now rather than later? A store without one needs another answer, and it has to be true.

• A last date for delivery before Christmas, given plainly.
• A cut-off for personalisation, such as engraving or monograms.
• A limited batch, where stock genuinely cannot be replaced in time.
• Gift services that make buying for someone else easy.
• A promise that lasts, such as a long guarantee or a repair service.

The first is the strongest, because it is a deadline the customer already cares about. Someone buying a gift needs it to arrive, and the date you can promise is real information.

Only deadlines that exist

The reason has to survive a second look. A batch that really is the last before Christmas is worth knowing about; a countdown that resets, or a limited run that never runs out, tells customers the store will mislead them.

False or misleading claims about price or availability can also breach the Competition Act, which applies to a small online store as much as a large one.

If nothing genuinely changes after today, say something else instead: what the product is, who it suits, and how to send it as a gift.

Gift services that do the work

Many December orders are for somebody else, and buying for somebody else comes with small worries: will it arrive, will it suit them, what if they already have one.

Each worry has a service that answers it: a gift note in the box, wrapping, delivery straight to the recipient, a receipt without the price, and an exchange that does not need the buyer.

Gift cards help the customer who cannot decide, and they suit a store that prefers not to discount, since the card is spent at full price, often in January.

Show these where buyers make up their minds, on product pages and at checkout, not only on a help page nobody opens.

Subscribers who are not waiting for a sale

People who signed up for a small store's emails often did so for the product rather than the price. Some of them bought last week at full price.

A sudden discount can feel to them like a penalty for buying early. A store that never discounts can say so, and turn it into a reason to trust the price.

Tell them plainly that the price today is the same as in July and will be the same in January. Then give them what they signed up for: what is new, how it is made, how to look after it.

A worked example

A cast iron cookware maker casts and seasons skillets and Dutch ovens in small batches in a workshop, and sells them online and at a few markets.

It has never discounted. Each pan takes days to make, and the price reflects that in every month of the year.

Last year it sent nothing over the sale weekend. In mid-December its inbox filled with questions about whether a skillet ordered that day would arrive by Christmas, and many answers were no, because the last batch had gone.

This morning's email has a plain subject line: the last batch that ships before Christmas, and the date it leaves the workshop.

The email explains why prices never change for sales, gives the engraving cut-off, and mentions the gift note and care card that go in every box. Most of it is about how the pans are made.

The same date and services sit at the top of the product pages on the website.

One email, written plainly

Keep the subject line factual. A date and a product stand apart in an inbox where nearly every other subject line promises a percentage.

Give one reason, one main link and a short list of the gift services. A long email trying to compete with every sale in the inbox ends up sounding like one.

Send it in the morning, as the day's buying begins, and to the whole list. Subscribers who ignore sale emails may well open one that is not.

The site on the same day

The website should repeat the email, word for word, on the home page's first screen and on the product pages: the date, the cut-off, the gift options.

Leave out anything that looks like a sale banner. A visitor who arrives expecting a discount should understand within seconds that there is none, and why ordering now still makes sense.

Check on a phone that checkout offers the gift note and a separate delivery address clearly, since many of today's gift orders will be placed on one.

Why steady prices help

A store that discounts every November teaches customers to wait for November. A store that never does lets them buy whenever they need something, without wondering whether they paid too much.

That trust is easy to lose on a day like today, and the policy behind it is worth stating plainly once a year.

The counter-case

Some stores should discount today. A store with stock it must clear before the new year, or one selling products everyone expects to see reduced, may lose more by holding out than by joining in.

A store with a few dozen subscribers may reasonably skip the email and simply update the website.

But a store that has decided not to discount should still speak today, with a true reason to order and the services that make gifts easy.

Today

1. Find your real last date for Christmas delivery.
2. Set any personalisation cut-off and state it.
3. List your gift services where buyers decide.
4. Write one plain email with a factual subject line.
5. Explain why your prices stay the same.
6. Repeat the date on the home page.
7. Test the gift options at checkout on a phone.

Step one is where the email gets its reason. A date the store can actually meet is useful to every gift buyer, and it costs nothing in margin.

The work behind a busy weekend is covered in Black Friday weekend from the store's side.

Frequently asked questions

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