Cyber Monday A'Coming

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It's two weeks until Cyber Monday. E-tailers are you ready?

Cyber Monday is, of course, what is touted to be the busiest day of the year for online sales. It comes the Monday after Black Friday (the Friday after Thanksgiving that kicks off the holiday shopping season at bricks and mortar stores).

With a sour economy, retailers are bracing themselves for lackluster holiday sales.

Here's where, you, the online seller, have a distinct advantage over your storefront counterparts:

1. You don't have to worry about overstocking or understocking inventory, especially if you use drop shipping.

2. You don't have to worry about hiring up a bunch of college students to staff your stores that don't earn their keep if business is slower than you hoped.

3. You aren't limited to the economic limits of your locale. Some cities and towns are clearly more harder hit than others. A one company town that loses its one company; well, you get the idea... Selling online gives you access to markets allover the world.

4. You can use your site analytics to make you more nimble responding to what's moving and what isn't.

5. You have more ways to nudge shoppers to close the deal; online promotions, e-mail coupons, Facebook, MySpace, Google ads, mobile marketing, etc. It beats the hell out of the hometown Wednesday circular.

Feel encouraged? You should.

Renee Oricchio

Renee Oricchio is a technology writer and former supervising news producer for CNN Financial News. She has been covering the computer industry since 1987.