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28 Nov 2011
Online retailers will be able to test the mettle of their hosting providers' services today, as millions of consumers are expected to start their Christmas shopping in earnest online.
According to figures from retail market watcher IMRG, £7.75bn will be spent online between now and the end of December. Almost half of this (£3.72bn) will be spent over the next two weeks.
Andy Mulcahy, communications executive at IMRG, told ChannelWeb that today – which has been dubbed Cyber Monday – will mark the start of a few weeks of peak activity in online sales.
"We still think there will be peak days, today being one, particularly as there is a lot of discounting going on to stimulate that activity," he explained.
"Having said that, this is following months of heavy discounting, as retail has been struggling, so we will have to wait and see how successful it is."
To cash in, many online consumer electronics retailers have unveiled Christmas sales promotions.
Best Buy UK has launched its closing-down sale, after announcing plans earlier this month to close all its "big-box" format stores by 15 January 2012.
The firm is offering discounts of up to 30 per cent on certain product lines in store and online, having ceased trading over the weekend to prepare for the promo.
Apple Premium Reseller Cancom also launched its online Christmas shop this morning, and said it is prepared for a brisk first day of trade.
"Cyber Monday has historically been far busier than normal Mondays for Cancom," a representative for the firm told ChannelWeb. "However, it is not necessarily the busiest day of the year."
This surge in online activity could cause problems for unprepared retailers, warned Dominic Monkhouse, EMEA managing director of datacentre services provider Peer 1 Hosting.
"Today is when most of us have been paid and hit the web to buy those all-important presents," he said.
"Customer frustration can be rife and there is no excuse for downtime or pages failing to load."
To guard against this, firms need to have an infrastructure in place to ensure their websites can cope with any unexpected spikes in traffic.
"We have seen a rise in e-commerce customers wanting a hosting provider that [can] support their online sales, which is a positive step for the industry," he added.
At the time of writing, consumer electronics reseller EBuyer was reportedly feeling the strain, after its site crashed within minutes of its £1 Christmas sales promotion being launched.
Would-be shoppers used social networking site Twitter to vent their fury at not being able to access deals.
"I swear every time @EBuyer has a sale, they don't seem to be able to handle the traffic #harshbutfair," tweeted disgruntled shopper @CarlDeanTucker.
"What's that #Ebuyer? Didn't think a £1 clearance promo would impact your servers? More fool you! #serverfail #sitefail," added @RichJeremiah.
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