10 eCommerce Marketing Strategies for Black Friday/Cyber Monday
The biggest shopping season is upon us – Black Friday and Cyber Monday! Both of these holiday sales are well-known to bring in high traffic and sales to eCommerce sites. This year, it is projected to be one of the most profitable shopping events for eCommerce stores, as many individuals are choosing to skip the in-store sales and shop from the comfort of their homes.
Is your online store ready for the huge boost in traffic? Do you have a plan created to build interest and get shoppers excited? If not, it’s not too late. Take a look at these effective eCommerce marketing strategies for Black Friday and Cyber Monday to make the most out of these holiday shopping events.
Ecommerce Marketing Strategies for BF/C
1. Create a Detailed Marketing Plan
It is essential to have a detailed marketing plan. This should include buzz-building campaigns that count downs and tracks when sales will begin leading up to Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Sneak peeks that go on during the week leading up to Black Friday and occur during the sale event. Promotions that utilize all your platforms from emailing and social media to all your other online channels. Boost word of mouth by using social media influencer and micro-influences. Your marketing should be cohesive and have a stand out theme. The goal is to grab shopper’s attention and then provide them with enough reminders that get them to click on your ads during the holiday shopping season.
Don’t forget to take into consideration your inventory. While you can create ads that create urgency such as stating while supplies last, you don’t want to run out of hot selling items that can bring in a great deal of revenue. This is also a time where you can easily unload a number of items that you have an overstock of.
2. Start Early
Some companies have been dropping hints about the biggest sale ever since September. Needless to say, waiting too long to get your promotions going can lead to getting lost in all the Black Friday hype. There are plenty of key dates throughout November that can increase your sales strategy, especially if you have a global market. Look into big sale dates around the world and jump on the opportunity to use these as a sale strategy.
Many e-commerce sites already begin having deals as early as October, thanks to Amazon Prime days and other shopping events, people are looking for gift ideas all year round. Establishing some pre-Black Friday sales ensures that you get the attention of early shoppers. Keep in mind that these shoppers will also lead to key, word of mouth advertising that can potentially bring in hundreds of more shoppers.
3. Make Sure Your Platform Is Ready
One of the costliest mishaps that can occur during Black Friday or Cyber Monday is a system crash. With the huge increase in users, it is quite common that most platforms won’t be able to handle the extra volume. Before the sales begin you want to up your site speed, a long loading time can be just as detrimental as a system failure. You also want to ensure your site is optimized for mobile buyers. Most people are shopping on the fly from their phones. You want to make the experience as easy as possible to ensure those mobile shoppers actually check out. Look over your mobile navigation and if you don’t already add on one-click purchasing. You also want to ensure that your site looks clean, images, and content load correctly, and is visually appealing from mobile devices.
On a desktop, views have your sales easy to find on the home page. Create categories that simplify the shopping experience. The more shoppers have to look around for what they want the more likely they will go to some other site that makes it easier for them to find what they are shopping for.
Before your deals are up and running do a test run of your site. This can be done using Google’s Page Speed Insight. This will give you a clear indication of how your site speed is running and will also provide you with tips on how to increase your speed.
4. Cater To Your Audience
Your promotions need to target your audience specifically. Since you probably have a wide range of people mixed in your audience you want to supply them with the promotions that will most likely pique their interest and get them to purchase. For email marketing, this can be as simple as determining who you know always opens your emails, who opens but never clicks through to your site, your loyal customers, and your VIP customers. Create a marketing campaign that caters to each group of your audience. Be sure to offer the best deals to you VIPers, since these individuals are not only more likely to buy, they are more likely to be your biggest spenders.
When it comes to social media marketing, begin by building up the anticipation of the sales that are about to occur. Add special rewards like free shopping, free gifts, a bigger discount for larger purchases. Utilize social media influencers who have a loyal fan base that will get your products seen by more. Offer these influencers special discount codes they can share in their post. Have them do unboxing so audiences get a full experience of what it is like to purchase from your site.
5. Promo Codes and Script Reminders
Promo codes have been used excessively in the past to get customers to purchase specific products at a lower price. They are fairly effective but they can also lead to customers putting in the wrong code, forgetting the code, and ultimately abandoning their cart because they can’t find the right promo code. While these codes still have their place in helping with your Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales, a more effective strategy might be to use scripted cards.
These cards allow your shoppers to see the discount they can get if they add a little more to their cart. You automate them to pop up each time they add an item to their cart or before they check out. The cards simply list all the deals and discounts on products or promotions they might not be aware of such as free shipping on orders over $50 dollars, free gift on orders over $100, buy 2 get 1 deal, or Free gift cards purchased over $150. These discounts are automatically applied to their cart at checkout, so they don’t have to worry about plugins in a code. This results in increased spending and reduced cart abandonment.
6. Create Gift Shopping List
Gift shopping ideas get a great deal of attention during the holiday shopping season. Releasing these throughout the month of November and during the shopping season can give customers new ideas for things to buy they may have never thought of. These lists make it easier for shoppers to find gifts that cater directly to them. This can range from the type of people (men, women, children, photographers, gamers) they are buying for or a prince point they want to stick to (gifts under $100, $50) as well as the best in certain categories (The best Cameras, computers, tech accessories, fishing gear). Make sure your list stands out and that they include items you sell on your eCommerce site.
What you can further do is create bundle deals that coincide with your gift guides to make it easier for shoppers to buy everything all at once and for a discounted price.
7. Re-Engage Customers
Shoppers at this time are constantly going from one site to another, which means there are more abandoned carts around this time of year. You want to do more than just remind you, shoppers, that they left without going all the way through to check out. Instead, remind them of the deals and discounts they will be missing out on. Many shoppers may begin building a cart on their phone and then wait until they are in front of a desktop to check out, by sending a simple reminder you can increase the chances of them coming back to their cart to check out.
8. Mobile Only Offers
As mentioned, mobile buyers will make up a majority of your shoppers and you don’t want to lose these ideal customers. With the rise of mobile use during the shopping season you want to make sure you take advantage of these shoppers. Providing mobile shoppers with exclusive offers will encourage them to check out now instead of later.
9. Get into the Giving Spirit
While most shoppers are interested in big savings during the holiday season they are also more interested in what else their purchase is doing. Since many sites will be offering can’t miss deals you can encourage shoppers to buy from you instead of a competitor by giving back. Having a charitable cause to donate part of your holiday revenue to, or donating products for every purchase made, is an enticing way to get shoppers more interested in your deals. This is now easier to do with Giving Tuesday that occurs just after Cyber Monday. Keep this in mind when creating your marketing campaign.
10. Extend the Holiday Sale Benefits
Whether it is setting up exclusive offers for early shoppers or last-minute discounts for late shoppers, you want to ensure that your Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals are enticing to all. Aside from additional deals for shoppers, be sure to include other ways to increase your sales. This can include savings on future shopping such as 20% off your next purchase, gift cards, and more. Offer free gift wrapping, a free gift with their purchase, or additional offers you can unleash to shoppers who make a purchase throughout the holiday season.
