Are you a handmade business owner and not sure when or how to prepare for the holiday season? No worries, I've got you covered.
This is my 6th holiday season and through the years I have had some good wins during the holidays and some major fuck ups. My first holiday season in business I was selling on Etsy and my sales blew the hell up during the holiday madness. Due to my lack of experience, I was not prepared, stressed out, and overwhelmed. I was up at 3am every morning to get as many orders made and pushed out before the post office closed. Talk about a merry fucking holiday season?
So now I spread the word on how to prepare ahead of time so that other makers do not have to go through that kind of stress. After all, the holidays are supposed to be about joy, not tears and stress.
Here are the 6 ways I prepare for a successful and stress-free holiday season.
- Plan your Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday sales.
- Make sure you are priced for profit. Go over your costs to make your product, how much you'd like to get paid for making the product, and if you can absorb the discount you have set for your holiday sales.
- Batch your holiday emails. Make sure you have emails written and scheduled so that you do not have to worry about that in the middle of the chaotic holiday season.
- Batch your social media posts. Work smarter and not harder. Repurpose your emails into your social media content.
- Dig into the data of your last year's sales to find out what your best sellers were and what is currently your best sellers. Once you have that order materials that you need to create those products and ship them now.
- Research vendors so that if you run out of a product you already have a list of vendors that carry the supplies you need.
I am wishing you lots of success this holiday season!
With lots of love and no fucks left to give,
Nicole