ChannelAdvisor Survey Finds that Success of the Holiday Season Will Make or Break the Year for Majority of Online Retailers

Survey further concludes that 64 percent plan to increase marketing/advertising or offer more promotions to boost sales

ChannelAdvisor Corporation (NYSE:ECOM), a leading provider of cloud-based e-commerce solutions that enable retailers and manufacturers to increase global sales, today revealed the results of its E-Commerce Holiday Season Survey 2016, a survey of approximately 200 U.S. and U.K. retailers. The survey found that 64 percent of respondents plan to increase digital marketing/advertising or offer online promotions earlier as their key strategies to increase 2016 holiday sales.

“We’ve seen online shopping start earlier in the holiday season the last few years, and consumers have become much more active on mobile devices. While Cyber Monday was the biggest online shopping day in 2015 according to our same-store sales data, consumers were much more active on Thanksgiving than past years,” said ChannelAdvisor Executive Chairman Scot Wingo. “It’s increasingly competitive for retailers to earn their share of consumers' wallets, and this survey shows that retailers are being proactive by offering up more promotions, boosting ad spend and beginning their holiday promotions right now."

The E-Commerce Holiday Season Survey 2016 revealed several key holiday-related findings:

The holiday season is critical to retailers.

• An average of 52% of annual sales for these businesses is dependent upon the holiday season.
• 48% of respondents anticipate that 2016 will bring an increase in online sales.

Top holiday strategy is to increase digital marketing and advertising spend.

• To increase holiday sales this year, 38% of e-commerce executives plan to increase their digital marketing/advertising budget.
• Within digital marketing, 40% of respondents use Product Listings Ads (PLAs) such as Google Shopping; 35% use both PLAs and paid search/text ads such as AdWords.

Fulfillment is the largest challenge for retailers during the holiday season.

• 51% worry about filling orders on time, while 28% worry about failing to respond quickly enough to competitor activity.
• 30% indicated that their cut-off date for guaranteed on-time Christmas/holiday deliveries is December 20th; however, nearly one in five businesses are now willing to guarantee dates as late as the 22nd or later.

ChannelAdvisor commissioned Morar Consulting to conduct the E-Commerce Holiday Season Survey 2016. Research was performed using an email invitation and an online survey. All survey respondents were e-commerce decision makers for their respective companies.

To view an infographic of the E-Commerce Holiday Season Survey 2016 results, visit: http://bit.ly/HolidayInfographic. For a summary of the E-Commerce Holiday Season Survey 2016 results, please visit http://bit.ly/2016HolidaySurvey.

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About ChannelAdvisor

ChannelAdvisor (NYSE: ECOM) is a leading provider of cloud-based e-commerce solutions that enable retailers and branded manufacturers to integrate, manage and optimize their merchandise sales across hundreds of online channels including Amazon, Google, eBay, Walmart, Facebook and more. Through automation, analytics and optimization, ChannelAdvisor customers can leverage a single inventory feed to more efficiently list and advertise products online, and connect with shoppers to increase sales. Billions of dollars in merchandise value are driven through ChannelAdvisor’s platform every year, and thousands of customers use ChannelAdvisor’s solutions to help grow their businesses. For more information, visit www.channeladvisor.com.

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Media Contact:Caroline Riddle, [e-mail]