With Black Friday and Cyber Monday taking place at the end of the month, we’re fast approaching the most crucial period in the calendar year for retailers. Black Friday is a relatively new introduction to the UK shopping calendar, but it has quickly become a much-needed outlet for e-commerce businesses and high-street stores to get themselves into the black ahead of the Christmas holiday shopping period.
Black Friday is a time of year where consumers are bombarded with offers online and off, making it more difficult than ever to cut through the noise and make yourself heard. However, the appetite for good deals among the nation’s many consumers around this period is insatiable, and this can still be a major revenue driving source for your online sales if you get it right.
Last year, online shoppers in the UK spent £1.49bn on Black Friday, with that total forecast to increase in 2019.
What is Black Friday?
Black Friday is an American retail tradition which has recently been adopted in the UK and other areas of the world. Black Friday takes place on the day after Thanksgiving, which always occurs on the last Thursday in November. Traditionally, this marks the beginning of the holiday season in the US, and, with people in over 20 states on a public holiday, retailers heavily discount their stock to compete for the attention of shoppers. The name ‘Black Friday’, refers to the balance sheet of retailers who often find themselves firmly in the ‘black’ when the period comes to an end.
When is Black Friday?
The big day takes place in the UK in 2019 on Friday 29th November. Cyber Monday, the online shopping event, which traditionally follows Black Friday, takes place in 2019 on Monday 2nd December.
Black Friday Marketing Ideas
The countdown to Black Friday weekend is on, and help you maximise your sales, we’ve put together a few helpful tips:
Offer Discounted or Free Delivery
Online shoppers are overwhelmed with choice around Black Friday, and you will have to fight hard to persuade them to buy a product from you rather than a competitor. A great way to do this is by offering free or discounted delivery on products in your Black Friday sale. While your competitors are focussed on discounted stock, you can steal a march by giving potential customers an extra incentive to buy from you by discounting delivery as well.
Exclusive Discounts for Email Subscribers
Kill two birds with one stone by offering an exclusive discount to anyone who signs up to your mailing list. By offering an exclusive discount to email subscribers, you are able to use Black Friday not only to generate sales and boost revenue but to grow your email subscriber list as well, something which you will be able to draw value from all year round in your email campaigns. This is a great way to get new customers in your email marketing funnel, as well as rewarding loyal customers already on your email list with exclusive Black Friday offers.
On-Page Visual Cues
Including on-page cues in the form of banner ads or pop-ups on your homepage and throughout your site is a simple but effective way to drive engagement in the Black Friday period. If your online marketing is functioning correctly, potential customers will be visiting your product pages from numerous different channels when Black Friday comes around, and it’s absolutely imperative that they’re made aware of the great special offers you are running as soon as they hit the site. Designing your web banners is a great opportunity to create something impactful that will catch the eye of your website visitors and inspire them to take action.
Start Early
In a relatively short period of time, Black Friday has become the foremost shopping event in the UK. Consequently, it is an event that shoppers now look forward to with some anticipation, as they look to grab some bargains in time for Christmas. With shoppers looking forward to snapping the best Black Friday deals, it pays for retailers to capitalise on that anticipation by getting their marketing strategy in place early. The best Black Friday marketing campaigns start around a week in advance, but you could consider going even earlier than that by building buzz around your discounts through email and social media. To maximise this early engagement you could even consider offering ‘early bird’ discounts ahead of that main event itself as well as including a countdown timer in your promotional emails.
Offer Different Discounts each Day
Some retailers will offer sitewide discounts for their Black Friday promotions, but a potentially smarter strategy would be to offer different discounts on different products over a week-long period. Making each day and each discount different keeps potential shoppers engaged with your brand as they return to your landing pages to check out the latest deals. As the offers are limited to a period of one day, a sense of urgency is also introduced, with consumers given an extra incentive to purchase before the timed discount expires.
Offer Stress-Free Returns
The world’s most successful online retailer, Amazon, distinguishes itself in many areas, but one that is often overlooked is the importance of its stress-free returns policy. Amazon rarely questions a return, and aim to make the process as seamless as possible for its millions of customers. Why? Because a convoluted returns policy is a barrier not only to the initial checkout, but also to repeated custom. Of course, Amazon is a huge multinational corporation who are able to offer prices and incentives that many other retailers are unable to match. However, implementing your own ‘stress-free returns’ policy for the Black Friday period may be worthy of consideration. You can use this in your marketing leading up to the event, as well on the website when people are in the process of making a purchase.
Do you need help managing your Black Friday offers, or in planning future online marketing campaigns? Contact digital advertising and PPC specialists Clark St. James on 01603 343477 or info@clarkstjames.com. Our team delivers a scalable return on investment for e-commerce companies across the major search and social media advertising channels including Google Ads and Facebook Ads.