The peak trading or holiday season may have been shortened by 6 days this year but the predictions for Black Friday and the holiday season still boast strong figures. We’ve gathered 11 Black Friday app stats that every retailer NEEDS to know for a successful 2019.
1. A staggering 2.2bn hours will be spent in shopping apps in the 2 weeks following Black Friday – App Annie
That’s a lot of hours being spent on apps during the holiday sales. Ensure you’re where your customers are and stay front of mind by driving shoppers to your app through the likes of push notifications, app marketing links and smart banners. Find out more about how you can use app marketing links to drive shoppers to your app in
our guide to app marketing links.
2. Black Friday sales are expected to grow 11%-14% year-over-year – NRF
Unsurprisingly, Black Friday is expected to be bigger than ever before. Make sure your app is prepared to deal with a growth in traffic for Black Friday compared to 2018.
3. Black Friday app commerce grew 63% year-over-year – Poq
App commerce is the continued channel of choice for loyal customers over holiday sales days. With your most loyal customers on app, make sure your app shopping experience is as frictionless as possible.
4. The 3 weeks before Black Friday sees a rapid increase in shopping app downloads – Poq
Shoppers look to download apps on the build-up to Black Friday in order to access deals early and stay in the loop. Use retargeting and smart banners to drive your customers from mobile web to app. By driving them to your app you can keep shoppers informed of sales through push notifications which are proven to have a
7x greater click rate than email.
5. App shoppers browse at 6pm, but spend their money at 10pm – Poq
App shoppers browse throughout the day on Black Friday. Apps saw a peak in traffic at 6pm, but a peak in revenue at 10pm. Try to boost traffic with push notifications between 9pm-10pm with a ‘fear of missing’ out messaging.
6. During ‘Cyber Week’ 2018, mobile generated 62% of online traffic and 45% of online revenue. – Salesforce
Mobile is the preferred channel for shoppers, for both browsing and purchasing. Having a presence on all mobile channels has never been more important.
7. On Black Friday 2018, mobile accounted for 69% of online traffic and 49% of online revenue – Salesforce
Mobile shopping affords convenience, with a strict time limit on Black Friday Sales, shoppers opt for mobile shopping channels.
8. Over a third of U.S. shoppers will leave a retailers’ site in favour of a competitor if they experience slow load times on Black Friday – Quantum Metric.
Having a fast shopping experience is crucial. Ensure your shopping app is ready for holiday sales by scaling up your servers and thoroughly load testing your app.
9. In 2018, the use of Buy Online Pick-up In-Store (BOPIS, aka Click & Collect) rose 50% in the U.S. over ‘Cyber Weekend’ – Adobe.
Utilising your app to drive customers into your store during the sales period can improve store footfall and increase omnichannel revenues.
10. Black Friday conversion rates on mobile are expected to outpace desktop for the first time this year – BounceX.
New findings from BounceX suggest that Black Friday shopper engagement will also be 114% higher compared to Black Friday 2015. In fact, our own research showed that fashion retailers embracing apps in their retail strategies saw
app visits overtake desktop visits during the holidays in 2018.
11. Successive returning holiday shoppers convert at 4.2% compared to 2% for all other shoppers – Monetate
Providing your best shopping experience over the holidays could not be more important. Encouraging loyalty year after year during the holiday season and retargeting holidays app shoppers should help to boost holiday revenue.
Make sure your app is ready for the holiday sales and peak trading season. Check out our Peak Trading Readiness Hub.
Peak Trading Readiness Hub
