The biggest sales period of the year recently passed, and as some retail industry experts predicted, online spending broke previously established records. According to Adobe's analysis of Cyber Monday, ecommerce purchases reached $2.9 billion on that day, a 16 percent increase from last year. Online sales in general were on the rise, with mobile also a more important factor than ever in how much revenue a company generates. 

"Retailers earned ten percent of their annual sales in just the last five days, an increase of 26 percent [year-over-year]," said Tamara Gaffney, principal analyst at Adobe Digital Index.

Merchants that deployed retail software with robust mobile commerce options may have benefited the most from sales between Black Friday and Cyber Monday. The total number of consumers buying items on their smartphones and tablets rose by 80 percent in comparison to the same period in 2012. Tablets accounted for 12.7 percent of all online Cyber Monday sales, with smartphones generating another 5.3 percent. 

Due to the increased popularity of buying products on mobile devices, Joel Anderson, CEO of Walmart.com, told USA Today that 2013 will be the year "online went mobile." Smartphone- and tablet-based shopping played a key role in Walmart.com's sales, with 55 percent of its Black Friday Web traffic originating from the gadgets. 

Online sales surged upward
Online sales broke previous records every day of the Thanksgiving weekend, and while omnichannel retailers achieved the most overall financial success, Internet-specific merchants captured a 42 percent share of all products sold on Cyber Monday, according to Adobe. USA Today noted that some Internet merchants experienced as much as a 44 percent improvement in Cyber Monday sales between 2012 and 2013.

USA Today highlighted that part of online retail's success is that the channel can provide shoppers with popular products that are sold out in brick-and-mortar locations. While enhanced ecommerce options may be integral to attracting future customers, improved inventory management may also help merchants succeed in an increasingly competitive and diversified marketplace. 

In light of retail trends from the most recent Thanksgiving weekend, merchants should invest in powerful ecommerce software that will be ready to capitalize on consumers' greater comfort with purchasing goods online. With mobile spending generating one fifth of all Cyber Monday sales, allowing customers to easily complete their transactions through smartphones and tablets will also play an important role for e-tailers. 

While it is easy to get caught up in the recent mobile commerce trend, desktop sales remain a prominent source of online spending, a recent comScore study found. According to the source, $18.9 billion in purchases have already originated from desktop computers so far this year, an increase of 14 percent from 2012 during the same period. 

Based on current projections, comScore expects that $48.1 billion in desktop-based sales will be reached by the end of the holiday sales season. Only $42.3 billion was generated in 2012. While no one particular day has exceeded the $1 billion mark, Nov. 14, 19 and 24 all individually exceeded $900 million in retail spending from home computers, and these numbers are predicted to be broken in the coming days. 

Even as retail industry professionals adjust their ecommerce software and point of sale systems to account for mobile purchases, they should also look to improve online shopping through more traditional channels. Laptops and desktops will remain important methods for buying products, and enhancing the customer experience through a streamlined transaction process can avoid issues like cart abandonment or consumers turning to competing merchants. 

Ecommerce is an important step for any retailer to take, as the decision gives merchants access to a considerable volume of new customers. Despite lacking a brick-and-mortar location in a region, businesses can sell their wares to anyone with an Internet connection. The decision is not without its challenges, such as figuring out the best way to deliver goods and manage inventory, but the examples set by other retailers can help overcome these obstacles. 

But just as ecommerce means thinking about a wider variety of customers, it also means considering turning to international sales. According to Internet Retailer's Top 500 Guide, the largest online apparel retailers operate on a global scale. The top apparel and accessories business, the Otto Group, commands 5.8 percent of the industry's Web-based market, and it operates in dozens of countries through its websites and various holdings. 

Along with international sales, Internet Retailer also emphasized that the top online retailers also focus on regularly acquiring other companies. With Hudson's Bay Co.'s recent purchase of Saks Inc., the source stated that the Canadian-based e-retailer might move from its No. 158 position in the Top 500 Guide to one of the top 10 slots.  

International ecommerce can also help brick-and-mortar sales
Those online merchants that prefer to think locally may eventually find themselves competing against numerous international apparel merchants, as is happening in Australia, according to the Sydney Morning Herald. Some of the retailers planning to set up shop in the country with new brick-and-mortar stores were inspired by the success of their online offerings within the nation. The source noted that for e-retailer Asos, sales in Australia were only outmatched by those in the company's native United Kingdom. This suggests that while online purchases can bolster current success, they can also provide insight into new, untapped markets that may be worth investing in. 

Because of the international nature of retail, merchants working within multiple countries or thinking of expanding into them should also deploy versatile retail software capable of working across borders and language barriers alike. These systems should also integrate despite linguistic differences to ensure that decision-makers are receiving the best retail business intelligence possible throughout all online transactions and levels of their operation. International sales can help unlock new opportunities, and robust analytics can assist in these efforts. 

For many retailers, point of sale systems that integrate ecommerce software are a must. Although brick-and-mortar purchases still dwarf the amount of money spent online, more consumers are turning to the Internet to find the deals and items they are most interested in. During the busy holiday shopping season, some customers will also browse the Web to avoid the crowds in physical stores. 

In Denmark's case, the ecommerce analytics firm Dansk E-handelsanalyse anticipates that new holiday sales records will be set this year. Emarketer noted that digital shoppers are predicted to buy DKK1.2 billion ($207 million) in goods this year, a 33 percent uptick from 2012. About 81 percent of the country's Internet users age 14 and older have bought products on the Internet throughout 2013, and this number is expected to reach 84 percent by 2017. 

Most of the retail spending in the country remains focused on brick-and-mortar locations, but ecommerce sales are predicted to reach 15 percent, up from the 12 percent spent online last year. Due to the growth in Internet-based purchases, merchants should ensure their websites and POS systems are robust enough to handle an increasing level of traffic. 

In just a few days, the biggest online sales day will be underway, and retailers will be offering the most considerable ecommerce discounts to their customers all year long. Cyber Monday will put merchants' ecommerce software to the test, and those deploying easy-to-use point of sale systems will be positioned to attract those consumers intent on taking advantage of convenience and simplicity. 

Yet when midnight rolls around on Cyber Monday, the sales will not stop for some retailers. Sears and Kmart announced that their promotions will continue for 79 hours, starting at midnight Central Time on Dec. 1 and continuing until 11:59 p.m. CT on Dec. 3. Imran Jooma, executive vice president at Sears Holdings, stated that this offer is meant to give customers more access to deals during the shortened holiday shopping seasons. 

With fewer days between Cyber Monday and Christmas this year, many retailers may need to improve their typical online and in-store operations to quickly move consumers through checkout and to handle what may be a considerable volume of customers shopping all at once. 

During this holiday shopping season, mothers will play an important role in shopping, with recent Adroit Digital research revealing that 71 percent of moms will be responsible for more than 75 percent of gift buying. Retail industry professionals will want to focus their efforts on appealing to these customers, and in many cases an appropriate incentive can convince them to buy more than they initially planned. 

While 39 percent of respondents said that the right online promotion might cause them to buy more than they initially planned, 93 percent of surveyed moms stated that a good ecommerce-based discount could also inspire an impulsive purchase. So while not all mothers will deviate from their holiday shopping budget, many are interested in finding bargains as they research products. 

Furthermore, millennials will be an important component of mobile commerce, with more than a quarter of young mothers between 18 and 34 planning to purchase 50 percent or more of their gifts from tablets or smartphones. Having the right point of sale system in place, with mobile options at the ready, will be critical to serving these customers. 

Ecommerce has been a boon to consumers by providing them greater convenience when they shop. Merchants with versatile ecommerce software and excellent supply chain management have also benefited by the trend by being able to provide goods to a larger volume of customers, sometimes with less overhead and expense than brick-and-mortar-only operations. 

Yet many retailers have also experienced online cart abandonment, and it is an increasingly problematic matter. According to research from comScore and UPS, 88 percent of consumers abandoned  a cart in 2013, which is up from the 81 percent who did the same in 2012. 

In some cases, merchants were unlikely to gain a sale. Half of the study's respondents said they wanted to gauge the total cost with shipping so they could compare the price to another retailer. However, 54 percent stated that they abandoned their cart after discovering shipping made the order more expensive than expected, while 44 percent left their purchase behind after finding out it was not enough to qualify for free delivery. 

Because of this, a greater degree of transparency leading up to the point of sale might diminish how often cart abandonment occurs. Clear policies on when shoppers qualify for free shipping, or what the price will be ahead of time, might improve online sales success. 

For retailers, the advantage of mobile devices is that they enable anywhere, anytime shopping. The moment that customers are interested in an item, they can use their smartphone right there to purchase the product without possibly forgetting about it by the time they reach a store or their home. Because of this, merchants should ensure that their ecommerce software is ready to handle customers who want to shop with their mobile devices. 

Although retailers cannot control where potential customers will go, they can influence when an item will be advertised to consumers. According to a recent Yesmail Interactive survey, 18 percent of all email-generated revenue originates on mobile devices, with most of those sales occurring on tablets. 

However, mobile retail sales still create $2 less in average revenue per purchase than would have been earned by consumers clicking on the same email on their desktop. This is an improvement from the average across all industries, though, where the difference amounts to $10 – and with email-based spending often being time sensitive, being able to grab shoppers' attention right away is better than expecting to catch them at a later period.