How to do your own Gift Guide

Today we’re going to explore how you can create a holiday gift guide that not only resonates with your fans but also generate a lot of revenue for your store.

Why use an online gift guide during holidays?

More than 50% of the shoppers avoid brick and mortar stores, especially during the most intense time of the year. Many shoppers do a lot of research before big sale events and holidays. In fact, people are researching Christmas gifts and gift ideas earlier than ever. According to the NRF:

• Consumers will spend 4.1 percent more during winter holidays than they did last year
• 40% of U.S. consumers begin researching their holiday shopping by the time November rolls around
• Consumers plan to spend a total of $1,007 on average for items such as decorations, candy, and gifts as well as other purchases for themselves and their families
• 53% of shoppers will spend their money on clothing and accessories

Also, Google searches for “gift guides” begin spiking in October, hitting their peak in December. Which still gives us plenty of time to plan for one!

What Gift Guides Look Like?

If you’ve never come across a gift guide before, here’s are a couple of examples of the one we’re sending to our partners.

Here’s the one promoting Black Friday, featuring gifts fans can buy from your store for under $35:

You can download the templates here, or ask your dedicated account manager to create one for you.

What should you include on your gift guide?

Write a short blurb at the top of the page, around 50-100 words, talking about what gifts you’re curating and who the list is perfect for. If you’re out of ideas here’s an example of a short and sweet blurb you can use:

“We’re on a mission to reveal the perfect holiday gift for that person who’s really hard to buy for. We’ve summoned up the geekiest presents you can choose from, all under $35.”

Next, we’ll pick a theme for the items to include in the gift guide. We could simply create one collection and call it “gift guide”, for example: “Holiday Gift Guide: Superhero Edition”. Or create collections to further categorize the gifts such as “gifts for the comic book lover in your life” or “gifts for nerds who want to leave the planet”

All that’s left now is picking out the right products to feature in there and we’re done!

Final step, you can publish your gift guide as a blog post or a separate page on your website, or include it into your upcoming newsletters. You could also consider publishing a series of blog posts covering gift ideas for different occasions and different kinds of products.