This year, Brits’ social calendars have never been so jam packed. After two years of cancelled weddings, festivals, holidays, sporting events, and more - the nation is set to come out in force to celebrate any and all occasions this summer. And this frenzy of festivities is scheduled to kick off before we know it, with the Queen’s platinum jubilee bumper bank holiday weekend just around the corner.
Whether you sell occasion attire, sound systems, garden party gear - or even royal collectibles - Britain’s most sociable summer could be a bumper season for sales.
With this in mind, here are our top tips for sellers looking for their slice of the pie, as well as some of the key dates for your diary (and the related opportunities across key categories):
1. Get your calendar out
As consumer appetite hots up ahead of a hectic summer, so will the competition – so sellers need to be prepared to get ahead of competitors to make their sales.
The first thing you should do? Align your calendar with your consumers’ by researching and plotting in retail windows around the big moments that are coming up, and ensuring you’re set up with adequate stock and people power to cater to increases in demand. Read on to see some of the key dates for your diary.
2. Do your research
To ensure your listings get cut through, make sure you’re making time for market research with the help of tools such as Terapeak Product Research. Free to all sellers – and exclusive to eBay – Terapeak is an effective way to research what your competitors are doing, how they’re doing it, and how you can improve your own listings on eBay to ensure you’re giving yourself as much chance of success as possible.
3. Make your listings work for search
To help make your listing get on people’s radar as one of the first results they see when searching on eBay, you should also make sure your listings work for search. An important part of this is carefully anticipating search terms – e.g. if people are celebrating the platinum jubilee, consider including alternative keywords that people might also be searching for such as “queen” “royal” “corgi” alongside “jubilee”, and include these in your listing where relevant.
And, to improve the placement of your listing in search results, we’d also advise optimising your listings to work for Best Match, considering using Promoted Listings tools to boost visibility, and adding Product Identifiers to your listings to improve searchability.
4. React to the latest trends
Preparation alone isn’t enough. As we all well know by now, surprises and opportunities are often lurking just around the corner. So, closer to the date of big social events, sellers should also be ready to react to last minute changes and trends and optimise listings.
For instance, the weather is one true unpredictable factor in many of the UK’s social summer events – and whether people are going to weddings or festivals, demand for emergency wellies and waterproofs could shoot up accordingly if the weather forecast turns unfavourable. Here, nimble sellers can be opportunistic and tailor their listings to the demand, whether that’s “party poncho” or “wedding wellies”.
If you’re a business seller, you can also make the most of eBay Shops to create and customise newsletters or special seasonal coupons, which you can send out to targeted sellers themed around those big retail moments.
Key dates for your diary – and the categories that could be set to benefit this summer:
Platinum Jubilee bank holiday weekend – 2nd - 5th June 2022
- With an extra bank holiday being gifted to Brits so they can celebrate the Queen’s 75 year Jubilee, new research from eBay Ads has found that almost half (45%) of UK consumers intend to celebrate the Queen’s Jubilee bank holiday whilst nearly a third (32%) have plans for hosting their own celebrations in the works. This could create big opportunities for home & garden category sellers as people spruce up and get ready to receive guests at home.
- And let’s not forget about opportunities that any royal occasion sparks off for those sellers in the collectibles category. Take a look at our article in New data released by eBay reveals that the nation is going mad for ‘Royal collectibles’ in the lead up to the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, with searches already up a staggering 700% in February 2022 compared to the previous month!
Wedding season – May to October 2022 (peaking in June, July, August)
- After a muted wedding season in 2021, big weddings are back with a bang this year – and brides, bridegrooms and their guests will all be in the market for stylish wedding outfits to showcase this summer – creating a booming market for fashion category and occasionwear sellers. In fact, our eBay data shows that this April (1st - 18th) searches for “wedding guest dress” “wedding dress” and “bridesmaid dresses” were already trending on ebay.co.uk.
Festival season – May to September 2022
- There are a whole host of big music and cultural festivals taking place across the UK from May to September. Among them of course, is Glastonbury Festival, taking place 22 - 26th June, which sees 200,000 festival goers flock to the south west.
- From tents, to glitter, to wellies, there are opportunities for sellers across a range of categories to cater to demand for festival paraphernalia. And data from ebay.co.uk reveals that people are already excited and getting ready. Searches for “festival outfit” were already trending this April (1st-18th) as people prepared their festival-wear.
Summer of sports – May to September 2022
- The usual big sporting events are set to back in full force this summer (e.g. Wimbledon, FA Cup, UEFA Champions League, Tour de France), and so are spectators, now that there are no more Covid restrictions in place in the UK.
- One of the biggest events of this summer season will be the Commonwealth Games, taking place in Birmingham from 28th July to 8th August 2022. This is sure to inspire people’s sporting passions, and spark an uplift in interest in sports inventory – great news for sporting goods sellers.
- On the other side of the coin, as people open up their homes to host viewing parties, electronics category sellers could see an uplift in interest in sound systems and TVs as consumers look to get the best set up.
Which social events are you excited for this summer and what are you doing to grow your sales? Comment below!
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