This Year’s Holiday Shopping Breakdown

It’s official. You don’t need to embrace the crowds anymore this holiday season unless you live for a midnight deal and a competitive race for the last item in your size. Stay in and let tech take over – the online shopping evolution continues to prove the future of retail is changing. As people spend increasingly more online each year, the numbers from 2018’s Black Friday and Cyber Monday are big. Here’s the full breakdown on online shopping trends that will continue to dominate this season.

Thanksgiving kicked off with a full week of shopping. Considered to be the best time to check off your holiday shopping list, many people were prepared to get it all done early this year. 

Have you heard of the Turkey 5? Amazon’s nickname for the five-day stretch between Thanksgiving to Cyber Monday has sparked a serious trend. With retailers emphasizing the official holiday shopping kickoff, it’s no surprise that these promotional tactics improved customer engagement throughout the weekend.

The official numbers were released earlier this month and according to Bloomberg, purchases on U.S. web retailers rose 23% over last year’s initial holiday shopping period – Cyber Monday topped in at $8 billion in transactions from 80 of the top 100 U.S. online retailers. This is up more than 19% from last year’s totals, Cyber Monday has become the largest digital shopping day in the U.S. It continues to gain popularity and promotion with the power of targeted social media advertising. 

Sponsored ads from user search bar activity drive consumer traffic online. On Instagram, online discount codes engaged shoppers through the Stories feature and scheduled posts. Many retailers extended the shopping day by a few hours to catch the last-minute shoppers with abandoned carts late at night. The more opportunities to engage with customers, the better.

TOP SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGIES FOR CYBER SALES:

The real reason behind this shift: online shopping provides convenience. More technology, more ways to shop. More technology, more ways to engage with customers. Retailers are constantly improving their sites to make them simple and easy to use. Modeled by the key players that dominate the eCommerce space, other retailers are taking pointers.

Amazon’s website is arguably the easiest eCommerce platform to navigate. To compete, Walmart released a new look for its website this past spring and wanted to improve its “recommendation” feature to give customers personalized suggestions on items they should consider buying. We can anticipate that 2019 will be the year of new site launches and features for retailers looking to enhance their online presence.

Everyone has access to this giant shopping catalog online – why wouldn’t retailers take advantage of it?

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