History of Black Friday

Black Friday was created at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries in the USA. Even before it got the name Black Friday, the sales themselves were linked to the American holiday of Thanksgiving. This holiday occurs each year on the fourth Thursday in November. 

A so-called “Thanksgiving Day Parade” is also associated with the holiday. These parades were and are sponsored by major American retailers. 

In the past, as soon as the Thanksgiving holiday arrived, the Christmas season officially began (there was once even an unwritten rule that Christmas goods were not sold before this Thanksgiving).

Black Friday in e-commerce

Although it is an American holiday, Black Friday is already known worldwide. For e-commerce players, it represents a huge opportunity to increase their turnover very quickly. However, along with profitability come risks. We've put together a few tips to make your Black Friday go smoothly.

Timing of the campaign

This year Black Friday falls on 25 November. Think about when we will start celebrating this holiday. From experience we know that it’s better to choose a strategy so that we launch a campaign sooner. Most advertisers also select this strategy, because they can fine-tune their campaigns before Black Friday itself. There are several variants to choose from; you can start on Monday or Friday a week in advance.

Planning is the foundation of success

Compared to other campaigns, everything must be planned and prepared in advance. Since the date is fixed, we have to be careful not to miss something either on the e-shop or in the documents. 

Set up campaigns at least 3 days in advance

Try to have everything prepared at least 3 days before the planned launch. The reasons are simple: everyone has a lot to do, not only the internal team but also, for example, the advertising systems that approve the content of ads. It takes twice as long as in other circumstances.

As for campaigns on Google, Facebook needs to be completely ready at least 3 days before launch. Ads are linked to a URL address, which, when changed, sends the ads again for approval; therefore, it must be prepared 3 days in advance, the same as banners, texts and the like.

Test the web

As for the website, it’s good to have everything tested and ready in advance. Is the Black Friday subcategory working properly? Do you have your filters adjusted? Are your assigned Black Friday coupons working?

Test everything on time – during the campaign, no one will have enough time to deal with problems.

Estimate a proper budget

A frequent mistake that occurs is not estimating the budgets for the performance campaigns themselves. It’s necessary to be aware that during 1 week there will be massive interest in shopping, and advertising tactics must be adapted to this. The problem with algorithms is that they can't understand and complete the "learning phase" of a campaign within a week. Therefore, there are 2 options that you should apply within PPC.

1. Don't be afraid to insert Black Friday ads into existing campaigns that have been running for a long time.
2. Create new campaigns but with a significantly higher budget! Higher budget is very important; in order that the new campaign understands what to do for the week.

TIP FROM OPINEST: It is difficult to determine the exact % increase in the budget as everyone has it set differently. For example: a fashion store from Black Friday in 2020 had a monthly campaign budget of €12,000 on average (per Facebook). During Black Friday, this budget went up to €7,000 per day.

Don’t forget to make it clear to the PPC specialists that accounts are optimised 3–4 times a day during this period, not once for the entire campaign!

Work with existing audiences

Use all available audiences from the past. It doesn’t matter that you have already tested the given audience; with BF, people’s buying behaviour changes significantly, and what didn’t work for you in the past might this time. Likewise, don’t be afraid to aim for broad targeting in performance, which perhaps doesn’t make that much sense in the classical period.

More expensive ads

Increased CPC, CPM? These statistics tend to increase during Black Friday and reach their peak on Friday. This is because everyone is advertising during this week.

Don’t be afraid to manually set an increased CPC or CPM. In this case, you’ll beat others in auction models and although you’ll have a higher CPC, you will be displayed and the sales will end with you. 

The competition at this time is everyone, not just your direct competitor as usual during the year. Be aware that people have a certain budget that they will spend, and it is up to you that they spend it on your product.

Product composition

The goal during BF is to sell out products from the old collection, but this cannot be the only goal. If you only put such items on sale, your offer will be uninteresting for two reasons:

• Customers already know this product and have a reason for not buying it
• With fashion, there is a problem with sizes

Organise your portfolio artfully and take the time to do so. Don’t be afraid to discount new goods, too; this will attract visitors to your website and open the way to the sale of other products. The average order value can easily increase several fold, so take advantage of it.

Warehouse and logistics

Question: Do you have a warehouse ready?

Answer: Yes, they know what they are doing in the warehouse.

Reality: The warehouse exploded; nobody knows what to do and where the goods are.

This is a stumbling block and danger of every single e-shop. During BF, huge pressure is put on the warehouse and logistics, as there is a significant increase in orders in a relatively short time. Even the best warehouse in the world has to count on the fact that a problem will arise that cannot be solved quickly, so prepare for the worst scenario in advance.

• Prepare part-timers for the warehouse (even if they have nothing to do, this is not a big investment!)
• Remove from the web site thank you mail messages on the fact that the customer has the goods at home within 24 or 72 hours
• Write to customers in the basket that the goods may be delayed.

Even if your warehouse does not fail, the courier may fail, for which you are not responsible, but the customer will blame you. Therefore, warn them about this issue in advance.

Customer Support

Do your homework and sit down with the people in charge of customer service. Look at the biggest problems from last year and eliminate them, so that customers don’t burden your customer support staff unnecessarily. The rule is that with just a few things you can eliminate up to 70% of complaints and thereby lighten their. They’ll have a lot of work anyway.

These were a few tips to prepare for this week; of course, there may be more issues from case to case; we’ve only summarised the most common ones. If you need further advice on Black Friday strategy, feel free to contact our consultants.