You Better Watch Out, the Holidays are here whether we like it or not.

Like it or not, and many bricks and mortar retailers don’t, the holiday shopping season is here. Black Friday can no longer be billed as the “official” start of the holiday shopping season, although you can still expect to see significant discounts and artificial opening times and early bird specials on the day after Thanksgiving.

Retailers have been pushing the start of the season earlier every year, but the real impetus for holiday shopping this year is the tremendous growth in online shopping. The 2011 Holiday Consumer Intentions and Actions Survey recently released by the National Retail Federation reports:

• 52.9% of retailers plan to start their marketing and promotions by Halloween, up from 40% a year ago; another 37.2% will begin marketing by mid-November.
• 51% of retailers say they have significantly invested in mobile-optimized web sites; 19.6% have invested in tablet apps; 35.3% have invested in QR codes placed in offline advertising, such as magazines and billboards.
• Among retailers who regularly use social media platforms, 72.5% say they have invested in Facebook and 41.2% in Twitter for the holidays.
  

Mobile phones will be important holiday shopping tools this season. Nearly 40% of the consumers surveyed by the NRF say they own a smartphone, and 52.6%, say they will use their phones to help them shop this holiday season.

When it comes to all holiday-related shopping activities—including checking prices, researching products and making purchases—online shoppers expect to complete 50.5% of those tasks online this year, according to the NRF holiday survey. All consumers, including those that don't plan to shop online, expect to use the web for 36% of those activities, up from 32.7% in last year's NRF survey.

Online shopping will allow customers to shop at their leisure, without fighting the holiday crowds. Web and mobile retailers will have a better chance than ever to capture holiday shopping dollars. Online shoppers report that they will start their holiday shopping sooner than the average consumer. 21.1% of online shoppers say they started their holiday shopping by the end of September, whereas 18.6% of all respondents did.

Smartphones and tablet computers will lead the way as shopping aids this season.
Nearly 40% of the consumers surveyed by the NRF say they own a smartphone, and more than half, or 52.6%, say they will use it to help them shop this season. Some other key findings on smartphones and tablets include:

• 31% say they’ll use them to research or compare prices.
• 14.1% will complete a purchase on their phones.
• 17.3% will use mobile phones to redeem coupons.
• 15.6% will use smartphone apps to research or complete a purchase.
  

Even if you’re not shopping online, consumers still plan to use their smartphones and tablets to research and compare features and prices. 70.5% of those consumers say they plan to research products with it and 34.8% say they’ll make a purchase on a tablet.

But the news isn't all cheerful for the web.
Projections of 13.5% online growth this holiday shopping season are three percentage points lower than the 16.5% increase registered in 2010, thanks in part to declining consumer confidence.

That uneasiness among many consumers will have an even bigger impact on brick and mortar store sales, as some surveys predict only a 2.8% growth in total retail sales for the 2011 holiday shopping season—just half the 5.6% actual growth in all retail sales reported for last year's holiday season.

Matthew Shay, president and CEO of the National Retail Federation, is trying to keep retailers spirits up. In a recent interview, he said that “retailers are optimistic that a combination of strong promotions and lean inventory levels will help them address consumer caution this holiday season”. How the season eventually turns out remains to be seen. Stay tuned.


-- Don Morgan


Don Morgan is VP Communications for PSAMA and Head Rainmaker at Raindance Consulting, a business development and social media consultant in Seattle.