It’s on every consumer’s calendar – Black Friday and the hopeful deals that come with it. In tight times such as these, customers are looking to get great discounts on one of the best shopping days of the year. As an e-commerce business, the amount of potential trade to be done can pivotal. But, what can you do to make that happen?
Planning your strategy to target customers and hit your goals can ultimately determine your success which is a big part of yearly revenue. Your strategy should be not only to land good sales volume on the day but also encourage profitable repeat customers and a strong LTV:CAC ratio.
Where do you begin though?
Start with your master plan and what you want to achieve.
- Know the tactics that you want to use which will most target your unique customers.
- Establish your KPIs - evaluate how effective your Black Friday campaign results were last year – ROAS, AOV, LTV etc.
- Determine what your budget should be and aim not to waste your marketing spend.
Jane Slimming, Founder of Zeal, a specialist brand and marketing agency for start-ups in the e-commerce space, offered this advice in her recent article on Black Friday. “Make your discount count. Reframe the idea of Black Friday as an opportunity to generate new customers, not just to make one-time profits. To define your strategy, make sure you are clear on the reasons behind your offer and what you are trying to achieve.”
Shopify.com recommends going deep into discounts, as buyers are looking for something extraordinary to get buzzed about. “The challenge for retailers is that as sales start earlier and earlier, it puts increased pressure on them to deliver the discounts they have trained their customers to expect,” (‘Black Friday Ecommerce: 15 Ideas, Tips & Strategies to Increase Holiday Sales in 2022’, Shopify, July 2022).
Targeting your existing customer base, those VIPs and loyalty scheme customers can super-charge your AOV (average order value) and encourage more referrals too. “Don’t be afraid to go even bigger with discounts and offers to your best customers. Highly segmented VIP emails often make up just 3% to 5% of your overall list, but those users spend three times more per recipient than other customers in your database,” (‘Black Friday Ecommerce: 15 Ideas, Tips & Strategies to Increase Holiday Sales in 2022’, Shopify, July 2022).
Jane from Zeal goes on to recommend:
Keep it simple
From a customer point of view, a flat discount across all products is the easiest to communicate and understand. That said, reducing a single product range is a valid strategy if you’d rather focus on increasing brand awareness over the long-term. Be clear what success looks like, and don’t jump on the bandwagon without understanding your KPIs.
Make sure your messaging is tight
Get your creative right and keep it consistent across all your channels. It goes without saying, but your social ads, emails, display ads, and website need to sing from the same hymn sheet – Black Friday is no exception. By all means differentiate the campaign from your normal activity, but keep it consistent with your overall brand message. Remember, you want to be recognised as you, not every other Black Friday sale.
Consider all your channels
If you’re going to do Black Friday, don’t half-ass it. Once you have your creative, commit to it on every channel. That means hero image, site content, emails to current customers, and organic social media all need to inform your current customers of the offer. Paid media, like social ads, PPC, display etc. will also drive new customers and let them know about your plans in the run up. We recommend a teaser campaign.
Get data
Black Friday is not just a sales tool, but a way to grow your audience and continue to talk to them. Use the campaign to increase your social following, collect email addresses, and grow your email list. Increased traffic is the perfect way to understand how customers behave and optimise your website and product offering down the line.
What else should you consider?
You should consider other factors that can make a big difference to your overall success and impact of your Black Friday campaign. Examine the following to help make the biggest splash for your e-commerce business:
- Start your advertising as early as you can and use all of your channels to spread the message and build anticipation.
- Check the site’s performance ahead of time to determine page loading times and site traffic volume and be sure to optimise reliability during that key Black Friday weekend is essential to customer successfully engaging with the deals on offer.
- Optimise site navigation and checkout experience ahead of time as well. “To boost impulse purchases on Black Friday, reduce the on-site barriers to buy. One-click buying enables customers to purchase items with a single click…also, kill the coupons and codes. Coupons and special Black Friday codes will be everywhere this year. However, they can be a hassle for customers who might use the wrong code or forget the code and abandon their checkout.” (‘Black Friday Ecommerce: 15 Ideas, Tips & Strategies to Increase Holiday Sales in 2022’, Shopify, July 2022)
- Create nurture sequences for abandoned carts to rescue sales.
- Develop an upsell and cross-marketing product plan to increase your AOV.
Conclusion
Black Friday is undoubtedly a great opportunity to maximise your end-of-year sales but also to increase your long-term, recurring customer base. Planning and ease of use for your customer is the ultimate key to your success in nailing it!
Is your business ready for Black Friday?
