Marketing
The guide to sell £1M on BFCM 2024: Build your win-big strategy
Ana Martinez
August 30, 2023
.webp)
Ana Martinez
August 30, 2023
Are you looking forward to making big sales this Black Friday and Cyber Monday? Matter of fact, both small and big online businesses have the opportunity to make thousands of sales within a few days, and attract a staggering number of new customers… granted that they are well prepared for an exponential orders surge!
In fact, you may be surprised to learn that Shopify merchants sold $6.3 billion globally between Black Friday and Cyber Monday in 2021, and that BFCM sales can easily account for more than 20% of annual sales volume.
If you want a piece of that pie and look forward to reaping the benefits of selling at one of the busiest times of the year, you’re in luck.
In this guide, we're covering the necessary daily steps you can take to position yourself and your business for success throughout the Black Friday and Cyber Monday surge.
Preparing for one of the biggest sales times of the year can help you bring in more traffic, double, triple, or even quadruple the sales you'd typically make, and cater to the needs of the consumers without worry.
What you will discover in this guide:
49% of shoppers have stated free shipping gives them more of an incentive to purchase during Black Friday sales
Source: National Retail Federation
$472 is the average amount consumers will spend on Black Friday, with most spending an average of $415 on Cyber Monday.
Source: Moosend
Consumers are more inclined to buy from brands that align with their system of values and beliefs, and recently, the Black Friday sales have won the spotlight of the clash between purpose-driven and business-as-usual brand approaches. But let’s be honest, everyone loves a good discount!
We hosted the Clash Friday event in early October 2023 and we asked merchants the main arguments pro and against the Black Friday Cyber Monday sales.
The founders of Unbottled, Kipli, PandaTea and Les Secrets de Loly, and Tim from Bigblue animated a heated debate around this topic! We’ve summarised them in the table below.
%20(1).jpg)
Brace yourselves, Black Friday is coming…
A Bigblue study of 300+ merchants revealed that brands working with us registered a surge in online purchases between 4X and 10X their average monthly order volume during the peak period (starting on Black Friday weekend and up to 1 week prior to Christmas) in 2021.
Source: Bigblue
Prepare your business to ship thousands of orders within a short timeframe. There are a few simple ways to get your operations and logistics ready for the potential surge you can experience during the BFCM rush.
During BFCM in 2021, over 47 million consumers across the globe chose to buy from independent brands powered by Shopify. Make sure you have enough inventory to meet the demands of these consumers!
Source: Shopify
Did you know that before becoming a shopping holiday to find great deals for basically anything you want to buy, Black Friday sales were inaugurated by electronics marketplaces to get rid of excess inventories?
Well, Black Friday has become so much more! While it still is an occasion to sell the inventory of your previous collections, it is the perfect opportunity to get new clients.
To ensure you can keep up with demand, keep track of your inventory more than usual leading up to the BFCM sale. You may have people putting in orders before the surge because they want to ensure they get their hands on whatever it is you're offering them.
Conduct stock forecasts to determine how much inventory you have and whether you may need to add to your inventory before the official sale date to keep up with the demand for products.
Bigblue tips
Use the Bigblue App to check your stock coverage
Bigblue allows merchants to track and centralise their inventory dashboards. It fully integrates with your CMS (Shopify, Magento, WooCommerce) and each purchase on your shop is synced in real-time to the Bigblue App.
Have a glance at your main inventory dashboard to discover the units sold and your stock coverage.
👉👉 Discover Bigblue’s Dashboard and analytics
%20(1)-min.gif)
70% of consumers will buy from a competitor if the product they need is out of stock in your shop. Don’t let that happen!
Source: Shopify
Demand forecasting within the supply chain is an absolute must to help you keep an accurate estimate to stock up on the essentials and anticipate the sales revenue you can bring in from the BFCM sales event.
Which products have become best sellers?
Of course, you want more than enough inventory to keep up with customers' demands for BFCM.
Why is this information essential for you to know?
But knowing your best sellers also helps you decide which products to start offering deals and discounts on to get consumers excited about any sale you plan to host during this period.
It is also a good opportunity to convince new clients to buy! Consumers are more likely to look forward to a special sale if it means getting something they want or need at a discounted price!
Bigblue tips
Use the Bigblue App to identify your best sellers easily
Discover your best-sellers, your inventory history, and other insightful inventory metrics.Look at your main inventory dashboard to discover the units sold and your stock coverage.
👉👉 Discover Bigblue’s Dashboard and analytics
.jpg)
Remember that 84% of buyers say they are unlikely to buy from a company again after a bad delivery experience.
Source: Baymard
With orders surge reaching up to 10x the monthly volume for some merchants in just one day… Make sure your logistics partner can keep the pace of your Black Friday sales.
Consider choosing a fast, reliable, efficient, and eco-friendly logistics partner for your products.
If you manage your logistics in-house, prepare to pack a high number of parcels. You’ll need to bring your whole team on board and ready to prepare and ship the parcels for your clients fast and without errors.
.webp)
Bigblue’s cheatsheet to optimise your logistics during peak periods
🎙 Communicate your expected sales to your logistics partner
Communication is key to a successful outcome when working with a logistics partner. By providing your expected BFCM sales to your logistics partner, they can give you the most accurate estimated delivery date for customers in each of your international markets, ensuring you can relay that information to your customers when making their purchases.
🏭 Send your stock to the warehouse
If you already have your stock ready to go, send it to the warehouse as soon as possible to ensure your 3PL will have enough time to process your inventory and have everything ready to pack and ship faster. Not shipping items to the warehouse in advance could cause significant delays, and consumers want to get the items they've purchased during the BFCM sale at record speed.
👉👉 Discover how you can use Bigblue to run your logistics effortlessly
22% of shoppers will abandon their carts when the items they’re purchasing will take too long to get to them. Don’t miss out on making the sale because of SLOW shipping times.
Soucre: Baymard
It's time to consider the carriers you wish to work with and the specific shipping speeds you'll offer your customers. Keep in mind - people want to get their items as quickly as possible.
In the digital world that we're living in today, most are used to two-day shipping speed because of Amazon Prime.
Gymshark lets their clients know that shipping delays for BFCM sales can take up to 10 days.
Communicate them clearly on your product pages and tracking emails to avoid frustration from your clients.
.jpg)
Bigblue tips
Lashilé Beauty uses Bigblue for an ultra-fast delivery during BFCM!
Lashilé Beauty's Black Friday marketing campaigns are the benchmark in the market. Their success found their match in Bigblue, a logistics partner capable of keeping the pace with them during peak periods. Last year, Bigblue prepared and dispatched over 15K Black Friday packages record time.
👉👉 Discover Lashilé Beauty’s success story
.webp)
During BFCM 2021, 15% of all orders globally were cross-border. The ability to ship globally can supercharge your business.
Source: Shopify
Are you expecting to receive orders from customers across the globe?
If so, you need to prepare for international shipping, which includes looking into logistics options, determining the cost of shipping products outside the country, and getting a better idea of the overall time these items will spend in transit before being delivered to the recipients.
Bigblue tips
Lashilé is a worldwide hit! Discover how they use Bigblue to deliver vitamin gummies
Lashilé Beauty has found in Bigblue the ideal partner to ship its thousands of orders daily and to support its international development strategically: in Spain, Italy, the UK, and soon in new markets.
"Bigblue allows us to ensure a very high quality delivery experience for all our customers in France and internationally.”
Yoann Assouline, founder Lashilé Beauty.
Did you know that over 53% of shoppers buy gifts for their loved ones, and for themselves during BFCM?
Treat your clients with unforgettable unboxings and grasp the opportunity to get User Generated Content for free… Unboxing videos have grown by a shocking 57% in one year alone.
♻️ Sustainable packaging is on the rise. The Global Green Packaging Market is estimated to exceed USD 353 Billion within the next six years.
Decide on the type of packaging you plan to use for products that will get shipped out during the BFCM sale. It's important to consider the following things when choosing your packaging:
Is it creative? Does your packaging stand out? If not, what can you do to improve its aesthetic and enhance the unboxing experience for the customers who buy from your business?
Is it eco-friendly? Consumers often appreciate business owners' efforts to use eco-friendly or recyclable materials to ship products instead of using wasteful materials that contribute to pollution and climate change.
Get ready for Black Friday unboxing hauls
Dermalogica’s unique unboxing made possible by Bigblue has revealed 155 million views on TikTok!Bigblue allows brands to offer a premium unboxing experience by using custom packaging with your brand's unique style and wrapping paper to enhance the unboxing experience. On top of that, you can add flyers with promo codes, thank you letters, invitations to share their unboxing on social media with a hashtag, instructions for using the product, and free product samples to help customers discover new products.
👉👉 Discover how Bigblue enables Dermalogica’s viral unboxing hauls
The total customer ticket volume increase during BFCM 2021 was 50% And over 32.7% of opened tickets are related to shipping and logistics questions.
Source: Zoho desk and Gorgias
Enhance buying experience from your business by building excitement with real-time delivery tracking.
Be sure to set clear shipping expectations to avoid possible disappointment if and when packages don’t get delivered within the first few days of ordering.
Reassure clients and let them know when their order is prepared, shipped and delivered!
Bigblue Tips
Use your order tracking emails to increase the LTV of clients acquired during BFCM
Using branded delivery tracking e-mails has many advantages:
1. They have an open rate of 75% vs 20 to 30% for marketing e-mails.
2. Each email is opened up to 4 times during the delivery.
3. Buyers that receive an email have a better repeat rate (+4%) than buyers that didn’t receive an email
4. And reduce bad ratings by -60%: they reassure clients, and overall increase their delivery experience. They are also a great opportunity to help you get more UGC!
👉 Discover Bigblue’s tracking emails
53% of consumers abandon their shopping carts because of excessive shipping costs.
Know how to get FREE shipping right
Providing customers with FREE shipping is a fantastic way to meet their needs and expectations while providing the best experience.
Offering free shipping on orders that reach a certain threshold is an effective way to make additional sales and improve the customer experience.
Dermalogica offers free shipping for purchases above 80€ and even more…Once their clients reach the 80€ mark, they automatically get a free giftAnd if they order at least 120€ in products, they will get a second article for free.
Bigblue Tips
CAVAL worked with Bigblue to implement a Prime-like delivery experience in their shop. By displaying multiple delivery methods (express, green, pick-up points, and free delivery), and providing precise delivery times, 92% of CAVAL’s clients are satisfied with their delivery experience!
Like Caval, allow your clients to rate their experience with shipping with their email thanks to their Bigblue app. A good way to boost engagement (and avoid bad surprises on Google or Trustpilot).
👉 Discover how CAVAL uses Bigblue
92% of buyers declared that they will buy again from a merchant if the returns process was simple.
Knowing that 53% of shoppers benefit from BFCM sales to lock in holiday gifts, adjust your return policy for the holiday sales.
It helps reduce pressure on your support team while providing consumers with an option to return items.
.webp)
Bigblue Tips
Extend your returns and exchanges date to mid-January
You can add a banner on your product pages to reassure the clients about their purchase. There is no risk if you allow your clients and their loved ones to try their gifts on!
Caval extended returns from 14 days to January 15th. They use Bigblue’s returns portal and Store Credit to keep their customers happy, and retain revenue with frictionless returns!
👉 Discover how CAVAL uses Bigblue’s returns portal
.webp)
During Black Friday week, the average website conversion rate was 2.72% — this jumped to 4.09% on Black Friday and 3.11% on Cyber Monday.
Meanwhile traffic was up 37% on Black Friday and 21% on Cyber Monday compared to the average number of daily sessions across the rest of November.
Source: Wayflyer
After iOS14's release last year, e-commerce businesses saw a decline in ROAS from 3.8 to 3.3 across Meta and Google Ads.
However, on Black Friday, with customers primed and ready to buy, merchants saw a jump in ROAS to 4.2. On Cyber Monday, ROAS was just above the post-iOS14 average at 3.4.
.webp)
During the week of BFCM 2021, 55% of purchases came from new customers, and on Black Friday and Cyber Monday, specifically, the percentage of purchases attributed to new customers were 55% and 54%, respectively.
Source : Wayflyer
Provide personalised messages to different people within your audience by taking the time to segment the audience.
When you take this step, you can send out specific messages to different groups of people based on their likes, interests, and particular demographics.
.webp)
🛍 Buyers: Identify the people who are more than likely willing to purchase from your business.
💌 Subscribers: Connect with your subscribers by sending out promotional messages on your BFCM sales. Let them be the first to know of discounts and deals you plan to provide.
🤩 Fans: Share content with fans via social media platforms, such as Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook.
👍 Remarketing: Detail new ways to bring in traffic and target new people for the BFCM sale.
🔥 Top-Line / New Customers: Think about what you can offer to new customers to reel them in and get them to make their first purchase during this exciting sale period.
Bigblue Tips
Expert tips from marketing expert Ezra Firestone
Ezra Firestone ran the BFCM campaigns for his cosmetics brand BOOM and got the following results in 14 days before launching his BFCM campaign:
🔥 461K Reach
🔥 1,3M impressions
🔥 2.86 frequency (each person saw his brand almost 3 times)
🔥 0.02$ for 15 seconds of video views
During BFCM 2021, he used this same audience to show SALES AD with promo codes.
👉👉 Discover Ezra’s strategy for BFCM
Gymshark generates 20% of its total annual revenue in the 14 days surrounding the holidays, and 40% of that is in the first six hours of Black Friday!
Learn from the best… In this section we’ll give you a full break-down of Gymshark’s Black Friday and Cyber Monday strategy.
🦈 Gymshark excels at BFCM!$
They created an amazing video where they explain their sales FAQS covering: Payment Methods, Shipping Information, Discounts, and Returns.
Instagram has 800 million MAUS. It's the perfect platform for advertising your brand and business to make sales, especially during the BFCM period.
Like Gymshark, post a teaser a day on Instagram
Instagram Reels have become an increasingly popular way for businesses of all sizes to advertise to targeted audiences, gaining more attention surrounding their businesses. Don't sleep on the potential to make more sales during the BFCM sales period by promoting deals and discounts through Instagram Reels.
87% of online shoppers use social media while making shopping decisions
Source: Statista
Create a BFCM shopping page on social media
Make it possible for consumers to shop directly on social media instead of going to your website. It's another way to bring in more sales and increase your earnings during the BFCM event.
For example, if you have a business page on Facebook, you can create a virtual shopping option for consumers who can view products you sell directly from the social media platform, add different items to their cart, and complete the buying process within minutes. It's the kind of convenience that consumers LOVE.
About 11% of social media users make immediate purchases and 44% do more research before buying.
Source: Earthweb
Prepare a gift guide for consumers to review
Want to increase your chances of making that sale? Create a gift guide. Your gift guide can include phrases like this:
For the fashionista in your life, you can't go wrong with getting the [product]!
We all know someone special who needs [product] in their lives!
Looking for that special something to get for your sweetheart this holiday season? Look no further than [product]. They're sure to love it!
Live Streams Influence 70% of Social Media Users in Buying Decisions.
Source: Earthweb
Connect with social media influencers
On top of promoting client reviews on their product pages. Gymshark added a special section on their Instagram account “GS Family”, every Friday, a bunch of lucky customers get featured on Gymshark’s stories.
Instead of attempting to reach those with millions of followers who are often harder to connect with, you're better off connecting with micro-influencers. Work with them to get them to post about your BFCM sales event.
In 2021 e-commerce businesses spent 5% more on average on Facebook ads on Black Friday week than the previous year, and the average Facebook ad spend was up 90% the week of Black Friday, versus year-to-date pre-Black Friday week.
Source: Wayflyer
80% of customers start the “customer journey” by watching branded videos on Social Media
Source: ThriveHive
Prepare your best VIDEO campaigns:
Video content should include customer testimonials, product demos, behind-the-scenes footage, and more.
Give consumers greater insights into your brand and business.
And run it with VIDEO VIEWS GOAL:
Set a goal for cold and warm audiences. The objective? Build huge audiences that will be ready to convert during Black Friday for cheap.
You can convert newcomers into customers who will order from your business again and again, even after the BCFM sale is over.
Bigblue tips
Matthieu from Stride-Up recommends keeping it short. The 15 to 20-second mark is the sweet spot for these kinds of ads.
Cabaïa, the famous backpack brand, masters video Ads! This Ad alone has generated over 30K likes in the last 30 days and has been shared over a thousand times.
We’re pretty sure we’ll be seeing this ad on BFCM!
Most business owners will create special bundle deals for customers, allowing them to get more products at a discounted rate. What types of bundles would you be willing to offer to the consumers? This is something to think about and focus on creating to give shoppers something even more exciting to look forward to, which will help you bring in more business in return.
Create high-quality graphics depicting images of everything included in these bundled goods for customers to purchase. If the photos are compelling enough, people will want to buy those bundles, which means they will spend more with your business compared to others, including big corporations such as Amazon.
Bigblue tips
Unbottled and Meuf partnered and launched a bundled offer for their clients on their newsletter "We are pleased to offer you a pair of Meuf Paris menstrual panties”
👉 Discover Bigblue’s logistics solutions
Ezra Firestone revealed the discount strategy to promote on your Ads for BFCM.
You can create a four-week plan for your promotion:
During the first week, offer a 10% discount
Give small gift cards during the second week
On the third week, offer 20% off certain products
On BFCM offer 30% to 40% discount
Companies that use phrases such as Black Friday and Cyber Monday in their subject lines can increase click-through rates by a staggering 64%.
Source: Dot Digital
Start building suspense for the BFCM sale with a series of emails sent throughout the week. No, this doesn't mean sending multiple messages per day. Instead, send up to three weekly messages, each including a little more information than the previous one. The idea behind this is to build that sense of urgency and suspense that makes people want to know what kinds of deals and discounts they can snag when visiting your site throughout the BFCM event.
Ezra Firestone set up an email flow for the early bird to warm them up to their sales!
50% of BOOMs yearly sales come from this campaign flow
1M people on their list
37K of them produce 50% of their sales, and they are repeat loyal customers
.webp)
Bigblue tips
Use branded tracking emails to continue selling… post-BFCM
Encourage your subscribers to register for the pre-sale to receive early access to discounts and promotional offers exclusively available to the mailing list. It entices consumers to engage, provides access to an incredibly active group of people, and enables you to increase conversion rates.
Unbottled systematically ads a banner with a 10€ discount on each of their tracking emails!
👉👉 Discover Bigblue’s Tracking experience
🐌 41% of shoppers will leave a site if it loads too slowly and then visit Amazon to search for the same item!
Source: Retail Dive
Keep website speeds from hindering your progress in making countless sales during the BFCM event. Test your speeds weeks in advance to ensure visitors to your website will have a speedy, smooth experience when browsing through pages, sorting through available products, and completing their purchases.
If your website runs too slowly, most consumers will get frustrated enough to leave the site and never return, meaning someone else will make that sale, such as your competition.
Put your website speed to the test! Use Google’s Page speed insights to spot optimisation opportunities!
In 2021, 71% of BFCM purchases were made from mobile devices, compared to 29% on desktops
Source: Shopify
Clients will see your ads on social media.
Make sure you’ve optimised the mobile experience to enable them to shop easily from their phones or tablets rather than a desktop computer or laptop.
BOOM drove traffic from their ads to simple landing pages optimised with a simple structure, with one option for mobile users and another option for desktop users!
Want to achieve the same level of success while bringing in more business during the BFCM sales event? Follow this approach:
Headline: Create a captivating headline that intrigues consumers. The goal is to reel them in with something interesting.
Sub-Headline: Include additional details with a sub-headline that provides a bit of extra information consumers can use to their advantage to learn more about your brand & products.
Image: Use a high-resolution, high-quality image of one of your best-sellers or something else related to your business for those who prefer visuals. The content you post can make or break the experience for consumers.
CTA: Never forget the call-to-action. Let consumers know what you want them to do, such as buy now to save big.
Thank You Page: Include a thank you page to show appreciation and gratitude to consumers for choosing your business. It shows you care about your customers and are grateful for them!
The transparency on delivery dates is something your customers will appreciate tremendously. Be sure to create a large banner that clearly announces delivery time estimates so your customers will know exactly when they should start receiving their packages. While these delivery times are just estimates, customers can receive packages before or by these dates!
+ 34% CRO with Bigblue’s Fast-Tags
Using A/B test, we have observed that buyers seeing a Fast Tag convert +26% more and are encouraged to spend more (+4% cart value).
⚡️ Oma&Me displays precise delivery dates on their product pages using Bigblue’s Fast-Tags.
👉 Discover Bigblue’s Fast-Tags
Creating a banner like this helps you develop a sense of urgency. It lets consumers know when to put in their orders to ensure delivery before or by Christmas. Most people want to get those orders in before then to have the items ready to give as gifts to loved ones.
+30% to 45%increase in the average order value for purchases paid for with Klarna
💰 Accept different payment methods to cater to more consumers:
Again, don't alienate shoppers by only accepting one or two payment methods. Instead, accept as many payment methods as possible to ensure that you can cater to a broader audience, receiving payments for the products you provide in countless ways.
💳 Add the BNPL (buy now, pay later) feature to the checkout:
.webp)
.webp)
.webp)
