If you’ve waited until “Cyber Monday” to see hope and see a jump in your sales for the holidays you’re about three weeks behind most online retailers.  The traditional myth is that “Black Friday” (the Friday right after Thanksgiving) kicks off the holiday shopping season as people rush to the brick and mortar stores to snatch up bargains on sale.  That traditional myth also got an over haul a few years back as internet shopping became more and more prevalent.

“Cyber Monday” was born!

But the truth be told, online sales start to perk up long before “Cyber Monday” as people head to the internet early to make sure their orders make it before the holiday crunch that grinds the post office to a slow crawl around mid December.

Thanks to the help of some trusted friends who are also in the online retail business like myself and thousands of other t-shirt entrepreneurs, I’ve gathered some data which shows this year’s initial sales bump for the Christmas season actually began around the 6th to the 9th of November.  In other words, long before the “official” start of the online shopping season.

This means that if you have not yet seen a boost in your online sales there is something hideously wrong!

For the online properties I own and operate the first up tick was clearly apparent on the 8th of November where sales volume in a given day was up a hefty 175% and has not let up since.  But there was a second up tick as well.  On the 17th of November, daily sales volumes reached 225% of normal and have not slowed down since except for Thanksgiving Day.  Which is expected since people are traveling and spending time with families and not shopping.

For me, this information for November coincides with the last two years of data as well where an initial bump seems to happen about three weeks prior to the fictitious “Cyber Monday” followed by another bump about a week later in the middle of the month.  It also seems to be a trend among other online entrepreneurs in a variety of categories.

This “stepping up” of online sales heading into the Christmas season seems to be consistent although some people have reported seeing three or four smaller jumps compared to the two I personally and normally experience.

And if trends hold there will be a third bump on or about the 1st of December and a final “crunch” starting around the 10th of December where sales volumes in a day will quadruple or more.

“Cyber Monday”?  Give me a break!  If I did not see a bump in sales until such a fictitious date I would lose far too much money.  This is exactly why you need to have your online stores ready for the Christmas shopping season by late October or risk losing sales.

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J.J. Jackson is President of Land of the Free Studios, Inc. and Cafepress “Top Shopkeeper”. He has been selling t-shirts on-line since 2004 and is the owner of the T-Shirt Entrepreneur, a site dedicated to helping people get involved in the T-shirt Economy. He is also the owner of Funny When Wet T-shirts, American Infidel Tshirts as well as many other online t-shirt and gift stores.