Back to School Special - Seasonal Trending
by Veronica Stone on July 30th, 2008
In order to maximize your profitability during seasonal changes, specifically with the back-to-school season, you need to remove the guesswork. You need to know exactly how the market is going to behave to make the most money.
Predicting the Future
How can you know when the peak sales are going to drop off? You can’t predict the future can you? Of course we can’t predict the future, but we can learn from our past.
Retailers keep track of what happened previous years to know how to effectively sell this year. Managers order enough calculators not only to get them through the back-to-school sale, but also the first few weeks of school. They know how to plan for this because of what happened last year.
The same is true with eBay. If you could see what happened last year with calculator sales, you could know when sales are going to start to drop-off.
With a market research tool like HammerTap, you can know what happened last year. With information like that, you can in a sense predict the future.
I used HammerTap to research calculator sales last year. I researched calculator sales for four weeks starting on August 23, 2006.
Below are the results by-week. Pay attention to how the Listing Success Rate (LSR) and Average Sales Price (ASP) change during the four weeks of sales.
The Dropping-Off Point
So when do sales drop off? Sales during Week 2, August 31 thru September 6 were the highest in both LSR and ASP. During this week, you can sell the most calculators for the highest price possible.
After September 6, the Average Sales Price drops rapidly. In one week you go from $66.85 to $53.95, a difference of $12.90. This is a huge drop in profit. While sales are steady at 77%, you are not making nearly as much per calculator.
Depending on your cost of the product, September 6 is your drop-off point. Even though sales are still high (that’s your Listing Success Rate) you may not be making enough money on each sale to cover your costs.
What’s your strategy then? Try to sell all of your calculators during Week 2 above to increase both your success rate and selling price. Selling during this week is going to maximize your profits for this product during the back-to-school season.
However, each product is different, and this is just one example. In order to maximize the sales of your products during seasonal and holiday trends like this one, you really have two options: 1) Try and guess when the optimal time to sell is or 2) Use a research tool like HammerTap.
JUAN MEDINA AMADOR said...
QUIERO SABER COMO PUEDO COMPRAR EN MAYOREO CON USTEDES?
PUEDES ENVIARME INFORMACION