Sale events have become a massive opportunity for e-commerce, particularly after the pandemic. In these two years, buyers have increasingly turned to online destinations to research, review, purchase, and even seek support for products.

For instance, sales numbers hit an all-time high during Black Friday 2020 as well as in 2021. SemRush reports that online spending for Black Friday reached $8.9 billion in 2021 and $9 billion in the year before. Fortunately, with the right marketing tools and strategies, you do not need to restrict yourself to events like Black Friday and Cyber Monday (BFCM). Prepare your infrastructure, apply the right tactics, and launch a killer B2B sales event any time of the year in 2023. Read on to know how.

Understanding the Meaning of Sales Events in B2B

Customers today wait all year long for marquee online events, such as Amazon Prime Day, Walmart Rollbacks and More, Costco Member Savings Days, Flipkart Big Billion Days, and others. These are often one of the busiest shopping dates of the calendar year for e-commerce. Customers anticipate promotions and discounts from their preferred merchants. In return, corporations are rewarded with substantial spending.

Did you know that e-Commerce has the same effect on B2B buyer behavior as it has on B2C buyer behavior. This is particularly true as B2B buyers migrate toward digital self-service. Two-thirds of Online shoppers prefer digital or virtual in-person engagements, according to McKinsey.

With the growing acceptance of online marketplaces, a stronger emphasis on enhancing fulfillment, and a focus on personalized user experiences, the B2B buyer journey resembles the B2C customer journey in many ways. These modifications make large-scale sales events essential for B2B businesses as well.

In fact, most SaaS products with business-facing offerings take advantage of this strategy to rack up subscriptions and renewals. But to achieve this, you need to first optimize your e-Commerce strategy and martech stack.

Tips for Optimizing E-Commerce for the B2B Sales Rush

Here are eight ideas to optimize income prospects when you hold a large-scale marketing and sales event:

1. Find and fix functional errors

Identify and address 404 pages, upgrade plugins, and security fixes, and evaluate the functionality of all eCommerce shop features. Examine promotional codes, if available, and permit upselling and cross-selling to boost average order value. Errors and malfunctions on a website should be minimized as much as feasible so that buyers who are routed through your emailers, newsletters, and ad promo codes can find exactly what they were looking for.

2. Improve the user experience

Every year, a growing number of online shoppers utilize mobile devices. Therefore, it is essential to guarantee that consumers can easily access your website no matter what device they utilize. If a website is improperly presented and does not adapt to portable devices (such as smartphones or tablets), users will likely prefer your competitors.

In addition, the suggested website loading time should not exceed two or three seconds. It is among the most influential variables in user experience, and may even influence the SEO for your B2B sales landing page. And, with each passing second, the chance of a greater bounce rate increases.

It is essential to reduce this possibility by using responsive design and continuous testing before and during any sales event.

3. Use segmentation data to personalize

Segmentation delivers clear advantages. E-commerce managers that make the effort to identify client segmentation and customize messaging for each subgroup realize ROI gains that regularly justify their investment.

At the end of the day, people want to feel as if you are communicating personally to them, as opposed to broadcasting mass-market sales pitches. This makes an even bigger difference in B2B, where many marketers lose the personal touch when targeting entire accounts and companies. The more your knowledge of your prospects, the greater your ability to influence their purchasing choices.

Top-down segmentation starts with the service or product and aims to tailor the offering to the most profitable market groups. Bottom-up categorization focuses on the preferences and personalities of the consumer, then tries to provide the most effective content to the appropriate customers. Customer personas are created as an extension of bottom-up segmentation. Both perspectives are required to design the most successful strategy for a marquee sales event.

4. Boost conversions by focusing on the right elements

One will need to conduct tests and site analysis to determine what motivates customers to purchase. For instance, using a program such as Hotjar, you can observe how users interact with your website. Do the majority of users just engage with items that do not need scrolling (“above the fold” components)? If so, you should not risk your audience missing a promo code by placing it below the fold. Run A/B testing on the key shopping-related aspects of your website while you still have time to acquire a large sample size.

5. Double down on SEO

Whether you offer physical equipment or Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) applications, improving your search ranking can help you climb well above the competition and increase conversion rates. Deploy a Search Engine Results Page (SERP) tester to determine your current ranking.

It is prudent to refine product names and descriptions. This will aid buyers in discovering your items during a search and improve the user experience. You can identify the ideal phrases or keywords for the product pages using free Google tools. A strong presence on social media also benefits your search engine ranking, making sure that you get maximum traffic for your online sales event!

6. Add a timer to your e-Commerce website

A countdown clock is a tried-and-tested method for creating a feeling of urgency and encouraging customers to make a purchase as soon as possible. A countdown timer encourages shoppers to purchase something instantly, as opposed to delaying the transaction and maybe visiting a competitor’s website. Additionally, countdown clocks are an excellent technique to increase demand and anticipation right before your sales event goes live.

Consider installing a timer a couple of days ahead of the event, and sharing it widely on social media. Social updates at regular intervals – leading up to the sale – can also act as a means for accumulating e-mails. Consequently, you will have a list of potential customers to engage with, once your offers go live.

7. Be creative with deals and discounts

Your sales pitch and deals are what will attract people to your e-commerce website. Customers often anticipate substantially discounted deals. Therefore, you may offer significant discounts on both new launches and old favorites without tarnishing your brand reputation. Here is a #protip: coupons add an unnecessary step to the checkout process by requiring consumers to perform an additional action. Instead, you may want to offer flat discounts, perhaps increasing the discount amount for loyal customers with whom you have a long-standing relationship.

8. Prepare customer support

To catch up with the number of buyers you attract with your sales event, try investing in an e-commerce chatbot. A chatbot delivers immediate customer support that can respond to approximately 80% of consumer questions. This allows your contact center to reply promptly to the residual 20% of inquiries.

Keep in mind that there will be brand-new clients at any sales event who are less acquainted with your offers and buying process. A chatbot may assist your consumers in locating the specific information they want. On an average order, they may also create individualized product suggestions, upselling, and cross-selling opportunities, helping you earn more.

Understanding the Sale and Discount Mindset

The key to successfully optimizing e-Commerce for a big-bash sales event is understanding the psychology behind it.

It’s in our most natural inclination — almost in our DNA — to enjoy a good bargain. Marketing content like Discounts, Clearance, Deal, Sale, 50% off, and Purchase 1 Get 1 Free — stimulate the release of dopamine in our brains. These offers bypass our rationality and activate our brain’s inherent neural impulses to look for, and hunt down deals, which essentially indicates value.

Additionally, shortage and community testimonials impact us. FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) is not limited to missing only a show or event, but also occurs when we miss out on a wonderful offer. A marquee sale event is indeed capable of appealing to the all-too-human inclinations of B2B buyers, for better or for worse, because of fundamental human urges and tendencies.

However, knowing what’s at stake and how consumers feel about an exclusive, time-bound sales event isn’t enough for B2B organizations. You must also examine their company’s market standing during such sales occasions and current B2B customer behavior (many may want a more B2C-like buying experience).

As companies and individuals expect limited budgets in the next few months (due to inflation and fears of a recession), a well-planned and executed event can capture a lot of traffic. Many will try to maximize these deals to obtain competitive deals without straining their purse strings.

Our Creative Black Friday Marketing Ideas guide is a great place to start if you are looking to launch your own “discounts day” in 2023. You can also bring out all the top marketing communication tools in your arsenal to get your clients and prospects rallied before the big day.