The Ultimate Guide to Black Friday 2019

The Ultimate Guide to Black Friday 2019

THE ULTIMATE GUIDE TO

BLACK
FRIDAY 2019

Planning campaigns for the busiest shopping day of the year need not be overwhelming (we promise!) We put together everything you need to know as you prepare for Black Friday 2K19.

STATS

Here are the stats that matter from Black Friday Shopping Season 2018:

Black Friday 2018

Black Friday 2018 (Thanksgiving Day plus Black Friday) raked in $9.9 billion in online sales – a 19.7% increase over 2017
(Adobe Analytics)

Black Friday 2018

$6.2 billion spent on Black Friday and $3.7 billion spent on Thanksgiving (a growth of 28% year over year)
(Adobe Analytics)

Black Friday 2018

14.8 million online transactions were processed on Black Friday 2018 and 13.7 million were processed on Thanksgiving
(Hitwise).

Thanksgiving 2018

Average per-person spending was $313.29 during Thanksgiving weekend 2018 ($217 spent on gifts)
(NRF)

Buy Online - Pickup In-Store

The Buy Online, Pickup In-Store (BOPIS) model saw a 50% increase year-over-year during Thanksgiving weekend 2018
(Adobe Analytics)

Online Conversions

Retailers with physical stores drove 28% higher conversions online
(Adobe Analytics)

MOBILE MATTERS

Site Visits

Mobile represented 51.4% of site visits (43.6% smartphones, 7.8% tablets) making it the first Cyber Monday where more than half of visits came from mobile.
(Adobe Analytics)

Mobile Revenue

Mobile accounted for 34% of revenue (26.3% smartphones, 7.7% tablets)
(Adobe Analytics)

Best Practices

What does it mean for your Black Friday and Cyber Monday Holiday Shopping Strategy? We’re so glad you asked!

Scale: Don’t Restrict Inventory and Set Aside Your Biggest Budget

The most reach is critical. 

Black Friday weekend raked in $9.9 billion in online sales and counted 28.5 million online transactions. That means a massive amount of shoppers are already ready and willing to shop online. Now is the time to go big or go home. Set aside a large budget.

Run nationally-targeted campaigns utilizing all 3 ad formats (in-feed, recommendation widget, and in-ad) across all 3 devices (desktop, tablet, and mobile) to ensure we are able to find relevant users at any time on any device.

Get access to as many placements as possible. Bidtellect is partnered with more than 30 supply partners for the most expansive network in the ecosystem, which means access to 58 million distinctly targetable placements and 10 billion Native auctions daily.

Performance: Optimize and Measure Post-Click for Qualified Site Traffic

It’s not enough to reach far and wide – aim for more qualified site traffic with placement level optimization, dynamic creative optimization (DCO) and qualified engagement measurement.  Dive deeper into the success of your Native Advertising campaign by using Bidtellect’s Engagement Score, unique proprietary technology for a deeper understanding of consumer engagement, so you can measure and optimize towards post-click engagement metrics such as page views, bounce rate and time spent on site.

Creative Insights: Copy + Image Matters For Maximum Engagement

[b]+studio is Bidtellect’s award-winning in-house creative team and they are experts in creating copy and images that draw in consumers and lead them to your content. Based on Black Friday (and all year long) performance, here’s what you should know: 

  • Include a promotional code
  • Be sure there’s a holiday reference in the images or copy
  • Children, pets, and people in images perform best
  • If using images with products, one solo “feature” product performs better than a group of products
  • Photographs perform better than animated images
  • Content/Thought Leadership: offer tips for the best gifts or creative ideas.

.

This was a best-performing Black Friday 2018 image with an eCPA of $2.16.

This was a best-performing Black Friday 2018 image with an eCPA of $2.31.

Consider the Customer Journey: Target and Retarget 

Since a consideration cycle is generally required to make a purchase – especially with so many choices and sales during Black Friday weekend – supplement a prospecting strategy with retargeting to drive prospects back to the site to purchase. Make it even easier to buy online and pick up in store, too. The (BOPIS) model saw a 50% increase.

Account for Mobile

It should be obvious, but maybe it isn’t. Before setting up campaigns, check that the landing pages you will be directing traffic to are as mobile-friendly as possible, from easy scrolling to readability to ease of purchasing products. Mobile represented 51.4% of site visits and accounted for 34% of revenue. 

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What We’re Thankful For (x5)

What We’re Thankful For (x5)

What a busy year it has been! From changing data privacy to the latest advances in technology, the industry has been bustling. As a Content Marketing Native DSP with a whole lot of ads to place and deliver on the cusp of the busiest shopping season of the year, we thought we’d take this chance to share what we’re grateful for this year.
We’re Thankful For:

Our Partnerships

Our 38 supply partners give us access to unparalleled scale (58 million distinct placements!) across ad formats, video, and devices, as well as further analytics and optimization capabilities! Thanks in part to them, we handle over 10 billion Native auctions daily. Thank you!

GDPR

Wait… really? We are grateful for the push it gave us to really hone our contextual placement capabilities and let our Forecasting 2.0 shine. We have deeply-integrated contextual targeting by category, keyword, and placement to understand audiences at the environmental level. And we stand by IAB’s standards of data usage!

Our Award-Winning Creative Services Team

For all things creative-related, [b]+studio delivers. From creating one-of-a-kind Native ads for clients to unique landing pages and content hubs, gifs, cinemagraphs, carousel units, and beautiful infographics like these using a data-driven approach – we wouldn’t be up and running without them!

Our Engineers

Placement-level optimization technology, optimizing multiple goal types, unique Engagement Score measurement, and continuous advancements and troubleshooting…our technology and engineering teams are the brightest, hardest workers we know. They’re constant innovation is making our platform the best it can be!

Our Sales & Account Management Teams

From creating, building, and maintaining relationships from start to implementation, our dedicated teams work with our clients every step of the way from training, planning, and forecasting, to campaign management, strategy, and insights, or can take a back seat for a self-service model! We’re grateful for their personalized support system to help you reach your goals.
And an extra special shout out to…

Our Fabulous Clients

Your trust in our ability pushes us forward, and your diverse goals challenge us to improve. We hope we serve you in the best way possible. #GoNative #ContentFirst – we’ll continue to do our very best to make your business thrive. Thank you!
P.S. We’re giving the whole month of November. Want to help? Click here.
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