Holiday Preparation Checklist

The holidays are inevitable events that happen every year. While it's one of — if not the busiest — time of the year, it's also a time when many companies ramp up temporary hiring, see how well operational processes are performing, and stop operations for a few days to have your team spend time with their families.

We put together this guide to help you think about items to review and complete during the holiday season to ensure operational efficiency.

Plan for the holiday rush

Outage

Review the Action Plan in Case of an Unexpected Platform Issue to understand best practices and suggestions for actions in case of a platform outage

Hiring and training

Onboard seasonal workers early – aim to have them fully trained by the end of October of any year.
Use Gladly Gladly Academy to train and certify your new hires (it's free!)
- Support Hero Certificate Course – This is the gold standard training for all Agents and Customer-facing service members who will be using Gladly. You may also use this training to supplement your company-specific training.
- You can choose from many L&D courses on topics such as Customer Service, Customer Experience, Conflict Resolution, Communication, and more.

Rules

Conduct a Rules audit, specifically those for spam and reassignment (e.g., ensure emails don't get stuck with an Agent if they are offline). Check out our Sample Rules Library here.
If not included, add hyperlinks to your email auto-replies and/or Agent signatures to direct Customers to important FAQ documents or other web pages.
Use Business Hours Rules for email/SMS/social messaging to incorporate holidays by using exceptions. You can have different automated messages go out at any time during the day during business hours.
Consider shortening your Conversation Reopen Window (the default is 24 hours) so more Conversations are treated as new. This may help you manage your backlog.

Voice

Make sure your IVR holiday hours are accurate if they are different from your regular business hours.
Update your IVR recording to mention high call volume, if applicable.
Consider adding an SMS or voicemail option in your queue IVR for Customers waiting on hold. You can do this yourself, or if you'd like assistance from our Professional Services team, contact Gladly Support to scope an SOW.
Utilize Proactive Voice to send bulk messages to your Customers about shipping delays, carrier changes, or delivery status.

Messaging

Make sure you have auto-throttle enabled for chat.
Ensure your Chat throttled message includes alternate Channels to reach you if chat is not available (SMS, email, etc.).
Activate a Priority Boost for chat using People Match if chats are waiting too long.
Reduce cart abandonment by activating Proactive Chat on your checkout page and/or activating chat payments to help drive revenue. Please contact Gladly Support or your CSM to activate chat payments.
Consider shortening your auto-end (not auto-close) times for messaging (default is 15 minutes). This gives your team more throughput by allowing them to wait less for Customers to reply before new messages are routed.
If you use Chat, consider Quick Reply buttons in addition to Quick Actions as a way to streamline your Customers’ chat experience and also customize routing, if needed.
Utilize Proactive SMS to send bulk messages to your Customers about shipping delays, carrier changes, or delivery status.

Email

Revisit the email setting going back to the same Agent (temporarily or permanently).
Save precious time! Automatically apply topics based on keywords or Entry Points using Rules.
Audit your auto-replies and make sure they include alternate Channels like SMS and are clickable using a hyperlink.
Utilize Proactive Email to send bulk messages to your Customers about shipping delays, carrier changes, or delivery status.

Self-service

Chat Self-Service: Use Quick Actions proactively to get ahead of questions you anticipate, like shipping delays, new promotions, advertising new product lines, etc. You can change your Quick Action content easily so it can be dynamic based on your market needs.
Pull Chat Answer Search and Chat Answer Usage reports on search results/answer usage. Use these insights to update Quick Actions, and/or create new Answers. Think if there are any holiday-specific phrases, like Black Friday or Cyber Monday, that you want to link to your promo/discount Answers.
Remove additional contact numbers from truly self-service processes.
Check the order in how you list your communication Channels on your website. It makes a difference! List your most efficient and least expensive Channels first, like email.
If you don’t have one, establish a Help Center on your website so Customers can quickly find answers to their top holiday questions.

Block abusive or spam messages

Get familiar with ways to block Customers if you see spam or inappropriate messages.

Monitoring trends and volume

Use the Summary Liveboard to monitor live trends, like Agent capacity and SLA attainment.
Use the Topics Liveboard to monitor trending topics for the day.
Use the Agents Liveboard to monitor Away states and more.

Measuring performance

Use the Daily Trends dashboard to monitor key metrics like FCR and handle time.
For more granular data on Contact trends, look no further than the Contact Summary report.
If you'd like to monitor Agent performance and workload, the Agent Summary Glance report will do the trick!

Before you leave for the holidays

Close the phones

Set up your IVR so that Customers who call while your team is out for the holidays to hear your greetings and messages during your holiday hours. You can even set up the IVR to have callers leave a voicemail so you can call them back during non-holiday hours.

See How do I close our phones to learn how.

Close Chat

Hide the Chat option on your website for days you are closed and allow Customers to use your self-service options for Chat.

A week before the day(s) you are closed, check the Closed box next to the days you are closed for the week coming up on the Chat configuration page. Click Save when you're done.
As soon as the holiday(s) pass, go back to the Chat configuration page and uncheck the Closed box if you are open on those days.

Set up auto-replies for SMS

Like emails, you can't stop Customers from sending SMS messages, but you can set up an SMS auto-reply to inform them of your holiday hours.

Create a Messaging Answer.
Create a Rule that uses the Messaging Answer you created to send an SMS reply to Customers containing your holiday message/hours.
Be sure to activate this Rule. You can deactivate this Rule when it's no longer needed.

Utilize Business Hours for Messaging Channel
You can utilize Business Hours alongside Rules to customize your messaging based on date and time.

Prepare Sidekick and App Platform for the holidays

Whether you're leveraging Sidekick for automated support or using the App Platform to connect your systems to Gladly, we've put together a quick checklist to help ensure a smooth and seamless holiday season.

Sidekick peak season tips

Sidekick is your first responder during high-volume periods. Here’s how to keep it running at peak performance:

Update your holiday returns policies

If you're offering extended holiday return windows, make sure to update your Rules and Answers in Sidekick to reflect these changes. This ensures Customers get accurate info from the start.

If your standard return window will change over the holiday season:

Modify any rules built into Guides that evaluate return eligibility
Update any Public Answers that mention the typical return window

Keep Sidekick on after hours

Consider leaving Sidekick on outside of business hours. This can help deflect common questions and provide helpful responses when your team is offline and experiencing a higher than normal volume of Customer inquiries.

Review the Sidekick Dashboard

Use the Sidekick Dashboard to:

Track overall performance.
Identify low-resolution Guides and Answers.
Pinpoint areas that may need improvement before volumes spike.

Small updates now can go a long way toward reducing escalations later.

App Platform peak season tips

As the holiday season approaches, the Gladly App Platform team is working hard to ensure our systems remain stable, reliable, and ready for increased seasonal activity. Because Gladly relies on many external systems through the App Platform, your own connected systems play a key role in maintaining overall performance and reliability.

To help you prepare, we’ve outlined key recommendations to ensure your systems are ready to handle higher-than-normal traffic and deliver the best experience for your teams and Customers.

Monitor and alert proactively

Set up robust alerting and monitoring across your systems and integrations. Early detection of performance degradation, API slowdowns, or connection issues helps prevent downtime when demand is at its highest.

Ensure API stability

Review and validate your APIs for scalability and reliability.

Confirm your endpoints can handle increased request volume without rate-limiting or timeouts.
Monitor API response times and error rates to identify potential bottlenecks early.

Conduct load testing

Perform load testing to simulate expected peak conditions.

Base your tests on your highest projected Contact volume and Agent activity.
Identify and resolve performance bottlenecks before the holiday surge begins.

Build securely

Ensure your applications and integrations use at least one form of authentication.

Avoid sending or receiving data from unsecured sources.
Review authentication flows to ensure they remain performant under high load.

Optimize image handling

When sending image links through Gladly, use smaller image files whenever possible.

Smaller images improve browser download and display times.
Optimized media keeps the Customer experience smooth, even when traffic spikes.

Prepare overall for increased demand

Most importantly, make sure your external systems can scale to meet increased demand. Your system’s ability to handle higher load will directly impact the overall reliability and performance of the App Platform.

Additional support

If you have questions about testing, monitoring, or integration readiness ahead of the holidays, please contact Gladly Support. We’re here to help ensure a successful and seamless holiday season for both your team and your Customers.