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It's not too late to get your holiday SEO strategy on track so you can make the most of your efforts this season. We've got some tips to help you "wrap" it up in time for the holidays.

Promote Your Promotions:
If you’re running any holiday promotions like products 20% off or Free Shipping, be sure to update your title tags and meta descriptions so these promotions display in search results.

Take the Guess Work out of Holiday Keywords:
Instead of guessing at what the best holiday keywords are, why not analyze the data you already have to make a wise decision. Look at your Google Analytics from last year to see which keywords converted sales. You could also use Google Insights and Google Trends to spot patterns in keywords that may be becoming popular and utilize them for some potential spikes around the holidays.

Consider a Gifts by Prices Pages:
You may want to consider special landing pages offering gifts by price categories. You can leverage the SEO attributes of these special pages and include holiday keywords too. Shoppers are always looking for bargains, so a “Gifts under $50” category could bring in sales and SEO during the holidays by optimizing for the term "Gifts under $50" in the title tag, URL, and meta description. Plus, Gifts by price categories can be updates for many holidays and bring added value all year long.

Incentivize Previous Customers:
Now is a great time to send out an email to your customers requesting them to review a past purchase. These requests have even greater impact if you can offer an incentive, like 5% off, on the next purchase. Not only do ratings and reviews add UGC that can increase sales, it may also assist in getting you ranked for additional long-tail keywords you may not currently target in your SEO strategy.

Update your Sitemap:
When was the last time you submitted an updated XML sitemap to the search engines? This is a quick and easy way to make sure they have all your new category and product pages indexed and updated.

Pay it Forward:
Consider a campaign where you donate a certain percentage of sales to a specific charity or to Hurricane Sandy victims. Everyone loves to give back, and this is a great way to increase sales while doing good for others. Run a campaign on your Facebook to increase your social outreach and increase links back to your online store for increased SEO.

Check Your Site’s Health:
You want to make sure your site is in good “health.” Google Webmaster Tools will alert you of any crawl errors or other issues you your site might. Fix any 404 errors and review your crawl stats to understand how many pages are crawled per day and how much time is spent downloading pages. Remember, if Google isn’t crawling your site properly you could miss out maximizing your indexation, which will affect your overall rankings.

Call (800) 808-8696 or contact your client manager today to learn more about how MaxEXP will help give your business the competitive edge and prepare you for the upcoming holiday season.

To encourage sales and increase conversions this shopping season you may want to consider giving back to your customers. We come up with a few ideas to reward your customers so they purchase from your store and spread the joy.

Free Gift with Purchase:
Savvy online shoppers are generally shopping a few sites at once. Consider a free gift with purchase to encourage them to choose your store. This could be a low-cost to you up-sell by utilizing overstock items or discounted products from a manufacturer.

Use the Recommender to Up-Sell:
Assist your shoppers searching for gifts by displaying similar products and/or product accessories. Showcasing these items on your product detail page and shopping cart page could provide that extra incentive needed to make a purchase.

Become the One-Stop Shop:
Create landing pages that turn your web storefront into a one-stop shopping destination. Promote different sales and drive multiple purchases by cross-promoting items that fit a certain theme like holiday gifts for him or last minute ideas. You can also make gift buying easy by offering Wish Lists and Gift Certificates. Be sure to promote these on the homepage during the holiday season.

Rethink Your Return Policy:
A good return policy gives shoppers the confidence to make a purchase on your site, especially when shopping for gifts. eBay Consumer Research has found that 21% of nonbuyers stated "lack of return policy" as the reason they buy elsewhere. Consider keeping holiday returns simple by offering something like "free returns on unopened items until January 31." The lack of a long list of rules to follow and a free return policy could be the difference when it comes to converting the sale.

Win Over Customers with a Great Follow Up:
Sending a follow up email is a great way to build customer loyalty and benefit your site at the same time. Follow up with a thank you discount on their next purchase and be sure to ask them to review any products they purchased as well. Ratings and Reviews add value to your site and help your shoppers make decisions. You should also include popular products in this email to get them back shopping on your site.

Pay it Forward:
Consider a campaign where you donate a certain percentage of sales to a specific charity or to Hurricane Sandy victims. Everyone loves to give back, and this is a great way to increase sales while doing good for others. Run a campaign on your Facebook to increase your social outreach and increase links back to your online store for increased SEO.

Looking to the Future:
Don't forget to create specific tracking links for your campaigns so you can measure their success. This will help you determine where to focus your marketing efforts next year...which will be here before you know it!

Call (800) 808-8696 or contact your client manager today to learn more about how MaxEXP will help give your business the competitive edge and prepare you for the upcoming holiday season.

As we approach the busiest shopping season of the year, you can expect an increase in traffic, including unique shoppers, to your site. To get into the spirit of the season, you may want to consider some minor creative enhancements that could result in bigger sales and holiday cheer.

Decorate Your Logo:
Take a page from Google's book and add some holiday flair to your logo. We can queue up designs for all the holidays and have them automatically change on the days you want so you don't have a turkey of a logo on Christmas.

Get in the Spirit:
Take a look at some brand sites that you really like for some inspiration to freshen up your own site. You want your site looking its best for the holidays!

Deck Your Homepage:
Add some new graphics or update your banners to help steer your customers to your sales pages and top-selling products for quick purchases.

Christmas Countdown:
Create a sense of urgency with a countdown on your homepage and sales pages. A real-time countdown showing how much time is left before the holidays will increase shoppers decisions and your conversions.

Spread Joy:
Considering sprucing up your descriptions and hiding "out of stock" or changing your "out of stock" messaging. Descriptions like "the perfect gift for any dad" are an easy update and may sway shoppers. Adding messaging like "ships in 4 days" in place of "out of stock" will guarantee you won't miss that sale.

Call (800) 808-8696 or contact your client manager today to learn more about how MaxEXP will help give your business the competitive edge and prepare you for the upcoming holiday season.

When determining where to make their online purchases, free shipping was far and away the deciding factor for consumers in the 2011 holiday season. Free shipping is also expected by most shoppers around this time of year, so you may want to review your strategy now for the biggest shopping season of the year. When coming up with shipping offers, be sure to keep in mind that in National Retail Federation's 2011 Holiday Consumer Intentions and Actions Survey, consumers said that "sales and price discounts" will be the most important factor (42 percent) when they're shopping online this season. A "quick and easy checkout process" (30 percent) comes in second place. To take advantage of eager shoppers, you may want to also consider these campaigns and days.

Top 3 Holiday Campaigns:

1. Free express shipping
2. Buy more, save more
3. Post-holiday

Top Days for Holiday Sales Conversions:

• Black Friday (Fri. after Thanksgiving): 23%
• November 28: 17%
• November 30: 17%
• December 6: 17%
• Cyber Monday (Mon. after Thanksgiving): 16%

We've come up with a few free shipping ideas to get you started.

1. Increase sales by displaying a message on the shopping cart page reminding shoppers that they are eligible for free shipping on specified minimum orders. If spending just an additional $10 more means free shipping, most consumers are likely to do so.

2. You may also want to consider activating a 24-hour 'Express Shipping Sale' that includes both free and express shipping when they spend a specified minimum amount. Having the sale for 24-hours allows you to control the cut off for express delivery, creates urgency and increases sales.

3. Remember National Free Shipping Day: December 17 is officially National Free Shipping Day(seriously). To stay competitive you should definitely consider free shipping on this day.

Our MaxEXP guest checkout feature, combined with our already quick and easy checkout process, is sure to help convert shoppers who may be on your site solely to buy gifts for their family and not themselves. There's no need for shoppers to create an account, just make their selections and checkout!

Call (800) 808-8696 or contact your client manager today to learn more about how MaxEXP will give your business the competitive edge and prepare you for the upcoming holiday season.

Now is the time to prep your email database for the holidays to make sure your get the most from your eblasts going into the busiest online shopping time of the year. We've put together a list of things you may want to consider, as well as a few ideas to build your list before the holidays.

Make Sure Your List Sparkles
Perform a simple data check to correct misspellings and typos to ensure your list has good hygiene. Check for any simple errors like @gmailcom or @yhaoo.com. This will help you avoid sending messages to invalid accounts, lower your risk of being flagged as spam and reduce your bounce rate.

Manage Your Undelivered 'Gifts'
Reviewing and understanding your undelivered mail is critical to successful email marketing and when done well may actually increase your ROI by not mailing to addresses that bounce. You don't necessarily have to decipher every bounced email, you just need to understand the difference between hard and soft bounces.

Emails that have a 'soft' bounce usually are a result of a full inbox or down server. You should consider resending to these addresses as there is a good chance they will be delivered after a second or third attempt.

A 'hard' bounce is a permanent deliverability problem, such as an invalid email address. Therefore, these emails will never be delivered and should be removed immediately. Internet Service Providers (ISPs) track the number of bounces you generate with each send and use it when determining your reputation. Too many bounces, and ISPs could block all your messages.

Trim Your Guest List
Deliberately removing subscribers from your list who haven't personally unsubscribed might seem drastic, however it is a current trend and best practice that savvy marketers are using to improve ROI. This way you are ensuring your lists only contain subscribers who are engaged. After all, if someone is only going to delete your message, why even send it in the first place?

However, before making this permanent decision you may want to consider a re-engagement campaign to rekindle their interest. One way to do this is offer a special incentive aimed at inactive users. Consider a 'We Miss You' or 'Welcome Back' promotion. If that doesn't work, simply ask them if they wish to remain on your list and include an easy way for them to opt out. If the subscriber remains inactive after a month or two then remove them from your list.

Remember: the success of an email marketing campaign should not be measured by the number of subscribers. Rather, it should be measured by the quality of the subscribers and the actions they take as a result of your email.

Spread the Joy
Whether it's at special events, on your direct-mail pieces or via a link in the email signature of your email correspondence, always drive people to subscribe to your list. As you continue to add people to your database you should see a growth in your list of active subscribers.

Keeping your email database fresh and clean is always advised but even more important before sending out your holiday marketing eblasts.

At San Diego Media we want to help you make the most out of your email marketing year round. MaxEXP clients should also take advantage of our fully automated emails that recommend products based your customer's transactions and interactions on your website.