No one is ready for the holiday music that starts playing in stores in early October. No one, that is, except the businesses that make a big part of their revenue from seasonal sales. For businesses that rely on online retail, it’s never too early to start planning for the additional traffic.

Peak traffic doesn’t necessarily mean holiday traffic. For some companies, the start of the academic semester or summer travel season might trigger a traffic spike. For others, it may be a monthly or daily deal. But for many countries around the world, the winter holidays represent the critical period during which a large percentage of revenue arrives in a relatively short time frame. Read this guide to share hard-won performance testing wisdom.