Are you preparing for the biggest shopping event of the year? With inflation rising and spending shrinking, no brand can afford not to make the most out of this Black Friday and Cyber Monday. To help make planning a little easier, we’ve made a list of the nine most common Black Friday Cyber Monday mistakes businesses to make and how you can avoid them.
Mistake 1: Funneling energy only into Black Friday Cyber Monday week
Many businesses make the mistake of putting all their eggs in one basket and focusing all their energy on the Black Friday and Cyber Monday weekend. But, over the years, BFCM has become an opportunity to drive sales for weeks. It is also about working on your brand, especially customer retention.
If you focus all your energy on one week, you will likely drown in the sea of discount messaging.
What you should do instead:
Get started now. Your BFCM strategy should fit into your overall branding and sales goals. Create well-rounded campaigns that help you milk benefits beyond the holiday season. An ideal approach would have three phases; Pre-BFCM, BFCM weekend, and post-BFCM. This ranges from building your SMS lists, driving app downloads before the weekend, implementing a customer retention strategy, and turning holiday shoppers into loyal customers.
Mistake 2: Only Offering discounts
Sales are significant, but if your entire strategy is focused on offering discounts and deals, you’re missing out on a huge opportunity to engage with your customers and build loyalty.
What you should do instead:
Your discounts should be unique and add to your overall brand strategy. Avoid getting in a discount race to the lowest price with a competitor. Instead, try building offers that support your other goals as well.
For example, are you struggling with building a community for your brand? Use the BFCM week to connect with your target audience and create a relationship. This can be through exclusive member perks and app-only products.
Mistake 3: Getting lost in the noise by only sending emails
Brands send out a lot of messages during BFCM. So how do you make sure your messages are noticed and converted? By using push notifications to your advantage.
What you should do instead:
Push notifications are an incredibly effective way to reach shoppers looking for deals. They help in 1:1 marketing and allow you to send effective messages, like abandoned cart campaigns, to follow up on orders. Create a strategy to send out push notifications and make each one of them count.
Read more about using push notifications to maximize sales this holiday season here.
Mistake 4: Not optimizing your app
If you have a mobile app, Black Friday Cyber Monday is the perfect time to ensure it’s running smoothly and that all your deals and discounts are easy to find.
What you should do instead:
Your store needs to be able to take the load of a BFCM sale. This ranges from loading time to checkout optimization; every step your customer takes should be smooth and straightforward. Make sure your app is updated and tested on all devices before the big rush begins, and consider creating a Black Friday Cyber Monday landing page within your app to make it easy for shoppers to find your deals.
Mistake 5: Not creating urgency
Shoppers are looking for deals, but they’re also looking for a reason to buy NOW. To make the most of Black Friday and Cyber Monday, you must create a sense of urgency around your deals.
What you should do instead:
Create a countdown timer, offering limited-time offers, and notify your most loyal customers with first-chance deals before you sell out.
Mistake 6: Not personalizing your communications
With all the Black Friday and Cyber Monday noise out there, it’s more important than ever to ensure your communications are personal and relevant to your audience. Shoppers are bombarded with deals and discounts, so you must provide your messages stand out.
What you should do instead:
There are several ways to personalize your Black Friday and Cyber Monday communications. Still, some effective methods include understanding your audience segmentation and strategizing your offers and communications.
Mistake 7: Ignoring data from previous years
One of the best ways to prepare for Black Friday Cyber Monday is to learn from your past performance. Look at data from previous years to see what worked well and what didn’t, and use that information to inform your plans for this year.
What you should do instead:
Use past data and statistics to understand what your customers will respond to. Create campaigns to run A/B Testing to ensure that campaigns are well-tested before the big day. You can look at conversion rates, average order value, and customer lifetime value.
Mistake 8: Not having customer support
Another common mistake is having insufficient customer support leading up to and during the BFCM itself. Shoppers will have questions about your deals, product availability, shipping times, and more. If you don’t have the staff or resources to handle an influx of customer inquiries, you could end up frustrating your shoppers.
What you should do instead:
Make sure you have enough customer support staff on hand to handle the increased volume of inquiries. Ensure that you provide them with the resources they need to answer shoppers’ questions quickly and effectively.
Mistake 9: Not downloading our FREE BFCM guide
Planning for BFCM and ensuring that your strategy is multi-faceted is complicated and, frankly, intimidating, especially since there is a lot of unverified data.
What you should do instead:
Plobal Apps has collaborated with eCommerce experts to guide you to maximize sales this holiday season. Our FREE BFCM handbook combines expert insights and the latest trends to ensure a smooth and successful cyber weekend.
So what are you waiting for?
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