December 30, 2009
By the ZippyCart Shopping Carts Content Team
The big online holiday sales push from Amazon.com, Walmart.com and other top Internet retailers seems to have paid off as overall sales were up this year. According to comScore, online sales jumped 5% this holiday season and overall online sales were approximately $27 billion during the period of November 1st through Christmas Eve. This holiday shopping season we had an extra shopping day, but after adjusting for that day, sales increased by roughly 3.5%. Ecommerce retailers are optimistic about this data as last year performed poorly for the online sector with sales dropping 3%. In a time when many brick and mortar retailers are closing up shop, online ecommerce shops are succeeding and new ones are debuting everyday. Early promotions from the major Internet retailers generated a lot of buzz for online shoppers looking for deals before Black Friday and Cyber Monday arrived. Online shoppers looked for the top deals on video games, consumer electronics, computers, and toys. Overall this holiday shopping season gives a lot of promise for online ecommerce shops in 2010 as the economy slowly picks back up and consumers start to spend more money.
One of the other big promotions that online shoppers enjoyed was free shipping, which in many cases was offered up until a week or so before Christmas. Another factor that helped online sales was the massive snow storm that hit the east coast on the weekend before Christmas. This forced many shoppers to stay inside and order online with rush shipping so they could stay safe indoors. Commuting to the malls and shopping centers in many parts of the east coast was extremely difficult during these days which unfortunately hurt local shops who were looking forward to the business. Ecommerce continues to be a strong sector in the economy and it is likely to continue as consumers look to save time and money by shopping online.
Scott is an avid fan of all things ecommerce. His claim to fame is that he "puts the Zip in ZippyCart." He considers himself the world-wide number one reader of TechCrunch, C|Net, and The Ecommerce Times. Scott has worked in the SEO industry for many years, but found himself always shifting his focus to review sites and ecommerce blogs. When we decided to start the ZippyCart Ecommerce news, Scott was an obvious fit. He handles most of our OpEds as he is a very opinionated guy. Scott is also our Twitter guy, so don't hesitate to send him a tweet if you see him online.
