Turning the e-commerce summer slump into a strategic move.

November and December typically top the charts thanks to holiday shopping, with January riding the wave of post-holiday sales. August and September often bounce back thanks to the back-to-school season. But somewhere between spring and autumn, things get... sluggish.

As temperatures rise, conversion rates tend to drop. Cart abandonment creeps up. Attention spans drift. Many non-seasonal brands are left wondering where all the customers went. Spoiler alert: they’re still online… just less interested in spending and more focused on planning their next getaway from a sun-glared phone screen, somewhere between poolside scrolling and a rooftop selfie.

Travel, swimwear, outdoor gear, drinks, events, and even some beauty categories tend to peak in summer with products that naturally align with the season. But if you’re selling furniture or tech, chances are you’ve seen traffic flatten and conversions wobble. Frustrating, yes. Fatal? Not at all. It can be an opportunity.
Because while summer might feel like a quiet season, it’s a strategic one. A chance to optimise under the radar, test bold ideas with lower stakes, and get your platforms in shape before Q4 sprints back into the picture.

Birds migrate. Maybe your e‑com should too.

Summer’s quieter pace makes it the perfect time to plan a smooth platform migration before the end-of-the year sales frenzy.

Learn how to future-proof it

Turn on the heat!

Discounts aren’t the only way to survive a seasonal slowdown. Before diving into full strategy mode, make sure your content and messaging feel as fresh as a summer playlist. That means updating banners, visuals, and tone of voice to reflect the season without leaning on tired clearance clichés.

A little relevance goes a long way. Smart segmentation, well-timed SMS, and lifestyle-focused emails based on past behaviour can keep your brand top of mind. Add in subtle offers, loyalty perks, or early access to post-summer drops, and you’re not just riding the wave, you’re setting it!

Strategy mode: ON!

When summer slows things down, creativity gets its moment in the sun. Whether it’s testing a new landing page, launching a micro-activation, or trying out a gamified giveaway, this is the time to experiment without the usual pressure.

So, what should you focus on? Here are five strategic moves worth the sunscreen sweat, each designed to boost long-term performance beyond the summer season.

Five ideas worth trying before September hits

• Revisit your exchange and returns policy

• Experiment with the landing and product pages structure and information hierarchy

• Optimise your search bar

• Run a micro brand activation event or try a gamification experience

• Optimise your checkout experience

Update your returns and exchange policy.

When was the last time you looked at your returns policy? A well-crafted one doesn’t just prevent headaches; it builds trust, protects your margins, and can even drive future sales. According to Shopify, 18% of shoppers abandon checkout because the return policy is unclear, and flexible options remain one of the most effective ways to reduce cart abandonment.
Keep it simple, visible, and aligned with how your operations actually work. Clarify which items are eligible for return or exchange, the timeframe for returns, the condition products must be in, and which items are final sale. And don’t bury the fine print. Make sure your policy is easily accessible on product pages, at checkout, and in your site footer.
Transparency builds trust. Trust boosts conversions. And if you’re not already nudging customers toward exchanges or store credit, now’s a good time to start. Come Q4, you’ll be glad you tackled it while the sun was still shining.

Trust is key!

A clear returns policy is just the beginning. From social proof to microcopy, there are plenty of ways to make your e‑com feel more trustworthy, and boost conversions along the way.

Explore 7 ways to build trust

Optimise your search bar.

Search is where intent becomes action. And if that experience feels broken, cluttered, or irrelevant, you’re losing customers before they ever get to the checkout page. According to The State of Fashion 2025 report by Business of Fashion and McKinsey & Company, 69% of customers go directly to a retailer’s search bar when shopping online, but 80% are dissatisfied with the search experience. Add to that the growing impact of choice paralysis, and it's clear that simplifying product discovery is a fundamental feature.

Helping users quickly find the right size, style, or category boosts conversions, reduces returns, improves satisfaction, and saves costs across fulfilment and customer support. If your current search bar is underperforming, here’s where to start:

• Introduce smart search features like typo tolerance, synonym matching, and predictive suggestions based on user behaviour.

• Use AI tools to analyse queries and refine how your site understands search intent. Especially when paired with a headless CMS setup, tools like Algolia, Doofinder, or our favourite, because it is open-source, Elasticsearch, can help surface better results in less time.

• Highlight filtering and sorting options that matter most, such as availability, fit, material, and colour. The fewer clicks between search and selection, the better.

• Monitor zero-result searches. These are goldmines for insights. Are users typing in terms that your product data doesn’t recognise? That’s a content issue waiting to be fixed.

Activate your brand closer to your audiences.

Summer is the perfect moment to get closer to your audience, outside the usual digital scroll. More and more brands are embracing creative activations to spark engagement during this season. Think music festivals, pop-up cafés, or collaborations with beach clubs and cultural events. From Glossier’s beauty setups at Coachella to Louis Vuitton’s ice cream stand in Forte dei Marmi, and even UGG’s solar-powered “human charging station” in Shanghai, brands are using physical experiences to create moments of pause, play, and connection.

But activations don’t have to be physical or high-budget. Even a simple digital experience can make your brand feel more engaging and unexpected.

That’s what we did with Hey Harper. We built a full-blown game on their e-commerce site. It might sound gimmicky, but it worked: players converted 7× more, added to cart 10× more, and had a 9% higher average order value than non-players. Conversion rates increased by 17% in the EU, 12% in the UK, and 9% in the US. Altogether, the game generated around €3M in additional revenue during their Summer Sale.

Gamification, when done with care and intent, taps into curiosity, reward, and a sense of play, exactly the kind of energy people respond to in the summer months. Whether it’s a quiz, a giveaway, or a light-touch challenge, adding interaction to your experience can turn passive browsing into meaningful engagement.

Experimenting with different layouts.

Summer is the ideal time to take a critical look at your homepage and product pages, especially when traffic is slower and changes can be tested with less risk. Tools like PostHog help you review heatmaps, user sessions, and rage clicks to uncover where users might be getting stuck. Are they skipping over key CTAs? Are product benefits buried under the fold? Small things like button placement, image quality, or how you structure specs can have a big impact on performance.

It’s also a good moment to rethink your hierarchy. Try testing alternative page structures, adjusting copy for clarity, or refining how filters and categories show up, especially on mobile.

Unlike most brands that slow down in summer, Hey Harper leaned into the season. Ahead of their Summer Sale, their second biggest sale moment after Black Friday, we worked closely with the waterproof jewellery brand to design and roll out a refreshed homepage, a new Shop the Look experience, and a 3-tier subscription model offering surprise pieces each month.

We also gave them the ability to change the website’s colour palette without any development work, allowing the visual identity to shift in sync with campaigns and seasonal imagery. By tying these updates to a high-impact moment, the new layout performed when it mattered most.

Lego-charge your store!

With a headless CMS and block-based design, your team can launch fresh, brand-aligned layouts, no devs required.

Discover how

Optimise your checkout experience.

A complicated checkout can undo everything that came before it. According to Baymard, 22% of shoppers abandon their carts because the process is too complex, and that’s something you can easily improve.

Start by simplifying what you ask from your users. Remove unnecessary fields, allow guest checkout, and reduce the number of steps… especially on mobile, where patience runs thinner.

Reinforce trust with the basics: secure encryption, visible trust badges like PCI DSS compliance, and payment options that match your customers’ preferences. Whether it’s PayPal, Apple Pay, MBWay, or Klarna, the more familiar the method, the more likely people are to follow through.

It’s also worth thinking about what happens just before checkout. On mishmash’s store, we recently introduced a subtle “You may also like” suggestion block that appears right after adding a product to the cart and a “products till discount” nudge. These are simple ways to keep users engaged without disrupting their flow, and a good reminder that small touches often make the biggest difference.

Enter Depeche Mode: enjoy the silence.

The e-commerce summer slump doesn’t have to feel like failure. It is, in fact, a rare pocket of breathing room to put on some tunes, regroup, and quietly build the momentum you’ll need for the months ahead. Whether you're refreshing your homepage, rethinking your product pages, or rolling out an interactive campaign, summer gives you space to make meaningful improvements without the high stakes of peak season.

At Significa, we treat this season the same way we encourage our clients to: as a chance to experiment, refine, and lay the groundwork for what’s next. So if you’re planning to test a subscription model, clean up your UX, or finally tackle that clunky checkout, now’s the time. We’ll help you make the most of the silence before the noise kicks back in.

Considering a native app?

Between sunburns and scrolls, your customers are still on their phones. A native app lets you meet them there, with timely nudges and better experiences.

Dive deep to find out if its the right move