A flash sale is a way to sell out your products quickly. A countdown and a deeper discount incite the impulse buying that most of us are guilty of.

It looks like quite an effective strategy, and it is — if you take care of everything before you commence. As good as it may sound, a flash sale is not only about offering a discount and throwing a deadline. You need to take into account various factors that ensure a successful or ill-fated outcome. That is the reason we are here to tell you how to make your first flash sale productive.

What Is a Flash Sale? Does It Work for Me?

Performing a flash sale means offering a promotion or discount for a limited time. This technique is effective for a reason: higher discounts and limited accessibility inspire customers to buy on the spot.

If you’re interested, however not sure if it works for you, look at the following statements. If you agree with some of them, then it is likely that a flash sale is a good strategy for you:

• You have to sell out products that have been in stock for too long. Let’s assume you need to sell last season’s swimming wear before a new summer season. Doing so, you make room for newer items that are selling quickly.
• You need to attract new customers, re-activate existing inactive customers, or drive traffic on typically moderate times of the day.
• You need to increase brand awareness and customer loyalty. Though a flash sale is more of a short-term impulse, it still educates customers about your ecommerce store.

If you want to launch a flash sale for any reason, you need to prepare thoroughly — a crazy short deal will attract people, yet what should impress them is the best shopping experience.

How to Prepare for a Flash Sale

Follow the instructions below, and you’ll be ready for whatever a flash sale may toss at you.

Specify goals

Decide the goal of your flash sale: clearing out excess inventory, targeting existing customers, getting new customers, or raising brand loyalty. Keep your aim in mind during the other stages of preparation.

Select what to sell and at what price

The first thing to do after deciding the goal is to research demand and discover what people need to buy now.

A Halloween flash sale won’t interest anybody in December. Or probably you need to throw a Father’s Day flash sale, meaning there will be a discount on the “For Him” segment.

Here comes another decision: Do you need to put the whole store on sale or just some products? It may again depend on the season or your stock, for instance, if you have an excessive number of unsold products of one kind.

After that, consider the size of a discount. It should stand out, and the bigger it is, the more attention it gets, yet remember that you additionally need to make a profit here. As per Experian, strong offers like 50%-70% discounts and a selection of desirable items make for a fruitful flash sale.

Choose your target audience

Choose if you need to sell to existing or new customers, as it’ll impact the way you’re going to attract their attention.

If your objective is attracting new buyers, then you may need to pay more attention to Google AdWords than to your existing email list.

If you target existing customers, don’t surge to throw your sale at everyone who bought from you. Prepare a segment for your newsletter based on the purchase history on your sales page. Think about the most and least important customers, or retarget the individuals who visited a particular product page.

Let’s assume you’re putting a big discount on white sneakers. You’ll require to make sure you skip the part of your client base that has purchased those items recently. They won’t be too glad to see they could have saved money on those items.

Check your stock

On a flash sale, items may sell out quicker than merchants expect. Ensure you have enough products in stock and prepare your inventory chain. You’re creating a fine line here: you don’t need to run out of items too early, and you don’t need to prepare too many products either.

Pick the day and time

If you use Google Analytics, check on what days of the week and at what time of the day you have more deals. Likewise, see when your email open rates are the highest.

Flash sale emails sent after 3 p.m. work out better than late morning or lunchtime sales. In most cases, you only need a few hours for a flash sale.

How to Run a Flash Sale

As soon as you have planned everything, it’s finally time to put your flash sale to action. Following the right steps, you’ll guarantee a profitable sale both for you and your customers.

• Notify customers
  • As a flash sale is limited to a short period, it’s important to make sure you have notified your customers in every possible way: via email, on the website, social media.
  • Utilize restrictive invitations and coupon codes, or make a “register for a sale” button to spark more interest. The latter is quite supportive when you’re targeting on existing customers and have a limited offer during a sale.
• Create sense of urgency
  • Motivate impulse purchases — use a countdown timer on product pages or on your website, that demonstrates how much time there is left to buy on discount, banners, and bars with special offers. Use Instagram Stories to publish sales announcements that vanish after 24 hours. Try everything that makes it clear: you’re passing up a major opportunity on a hell of a deal right now!
• Attract attention
  • When customers know your sale, it’s important to keep their attention. You can offer free shipping to the first 100 buyers or give some gifts. Try various sales models: an early-bird flash in advance, a VIP flash, and even a mystery flash sale, when people don’t have a clue what will be on discount before the sale starts.
• Communicate
  • Be ready to communicate with customers fast in case they have questions on every channel possible: social media, live chats, email. When a sale is a matter of hours, people expect a quick and polite service even more than expected.

Next Step?

After you’re finished with your first flash sale, it’s time to analyze the results: Did you define the right goal and were you able to achieve it? Where would you be able to have paid more attention, and what were your strong focuses?

Flash sales work out best when customers are left with an extraordinary shopping experience and perception of your online store: that incorporates not only a good discount on a quality product but also customer service and timely dispatching.

If everything worked out like a charm, then it’s time to announce to your customers when the next flash sale is! The holiday season is coming, and you’ll need to start flash sale promotions again.