Everything You Need to Know About BFCM 2024
It’s hard to imagine that the last BFCM was 12 months ago, and we are only a few days shy of it. It’s also interesting to note how it has evolved from a single day of pandemonium to an extended sales window spanning November. In this article, we share a BFCM checklist.
What is BFCM?
BFCM means Black Friday Cyber Monday. For most ecommerce stores, this shopping event is the most important time of the year in sales and traffic.
[Insert Black Friday offer image]
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BFCM 2023 stats
Here are some of the surprising facts:
Over $9.8 billion in sales were closed in 2023 during Black Friday deals alone.
Cyber Monday exceeded $12.4 million in online spending in 2023.
141.9 million consumers shopped on Super Saturday of December 23rd, 2023.
2023 record a 75.7% online increase in BFCM sales, up from the 55% rise of 2022.
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When is BFCM 2024?
This year's BFCM offers will roll out on November 29—a day after Thanksgiving. Cyber Monday will fall on December 2.
Start preparing early
It’s Business 101. As consumers get the better of the summer swing, retail marketers are preparing for fall’s clothing demand to get their holiday shopping season plans into shape. Here are a few steps one can take when preparing for BFCM rush:
Plan your promotions
The retail season tends to start earlier every year, meaning you should have a BFCM marketing strategy planned out for the year. Most successful brands have their plans in full gear by Q3 giving them ample time to run smooth marketing campaigns across media channels, both paid (paid ads, media buys, social media) and owned (SMS, email, mobile devices). Furthermore, it is not uncommon to see audience-minded brands share pop-up forms across their sites and socials to build out a pipeline of SMS and email.
Remember last year’s BFCM? It was a period of high traffic and you risk not having a solid email outreach strategy if you delay. In that regard, have an automated solution to deliver and ramp up sending in place by the latest August. With that out of the way, in September you can shift to growing your list and testing working strategies. October can focus on your sending strategy where you edit flows, forms and get a better understanding of the discounts and deals on offer before executing this content in November.
Here are some key areas one should focus on in the coming months:
Learn from your performance in past campaigns—Look at the results of past BFCM campaigns offering invaluable insights.
Invest in holidays—tons of shoppers flock during BFCM for enough customer support staff and resources to handle complaints, queries, and other customer interactions.
Optimize the post-purchase experience—first-time shoppers who get a seamless post-purchase experience often turn into loyal customers.
Grow an audience
As you head into Q4, have a solid pipeline of leads by investing in strategies that grow and expand your target audience and marketing lists. The larger your contact pool the better. Here are a few ways of growing and achieving a successful BFCM:
Social Media—draft engaging content such as quizzes, polls, and other user-generated content. Share reels and stories on TikTok or Instagram.
Influencers—collaborate to create unique content resonating with an influencer’s audience.
Website pop-ups—Showcase pop-ups with special incentives for people to sign-up and other special offers.
Paid Ads—Launch retargeting ad campaigns showing who visited your site but could not make a purchase. Facebook also helps target similar audiences.
Pick a BFCM offer
Your aim is to find the right balance between enticement and staying profitable. In that regard, you can be crafty in your presentation with tactics like free shipping, bundled deals, or exclusive products.
Here are deals or discounts you can apply this BFCM season:
Cash discounts—such as $20 off on certain purchases made.
Early bird specials—applicable to the first wave of shoppers
Buy-One-Get-One offers—often great deals to clear out inventory.
Gifted purchases—add a bonus item onto a certain item provided you buy at a certain price point.
Free shipping—encourages bigger carts and higher conversion rates when meeting certain purchase thresholds.
Bundles—grouping products at a reduced rate.
Door crashers—time and quantity limited discounts on popular items.
Extended returns—save shoppers the trouble with long return windows
Gift cards—for instance a free $10 card on every $150 spent.
Exclusive member discounts—reward loyal customers and incentivize return buyers.
Category deals—apply to a group of items, for instance 40% off all kitchenware.
Have compelling messaging
Keep in mind that marketing efforts should be all-rounded heading into Christmas. Most small businesses today factor in BFCM as a weeklong event, that culminates after a year’s long preparation effort. BFCM messaging combines your brand values and attractive offers. Here is how you can resonate:
Audience insights—run an analysis of customer data. If sustainability matters to your audience you can mention you use green shipping throughout the BFCM promo.
Highlight unique selling point—If your products are handcrafted, include that in the messaging.
Create an urgency—-maximize on phrases that emphasize limited-time or quantity such as “Only 100 items remaining!” or “Deadline midnight!” to create fear of missing out.
Uniformity in messaging—for instance, if you are promoting a “Buy 3, Get 1 Free” email, ensure your social media posts on Facebook convey the same.
Build your marketing assets
Run a comprehensive BFCM marketing strategy touching on every point potential customers have optimized for sales events. The assets should be cohesive and reflect the central theme focussed on messaging campaigns.
Consider the breakdown here:
Website update—have the latest BFCM banners, deals and landing pages.
Blog posts—draft content that is engaging highlighting BFCM offers, product features, and shopping tips.
Text and email copy—-design emails and SMS campaigns that are compelling while informing subscribers on BFCM deals with persuasive copy or eye-catching visuals.
Video—prepare video content showcasing video tutorials, products, and customer testimonials.
Social media graphics—design graphics tailored for each social platform while promoting other BFCM deals.
Fix any issues with your site—Run site audits to point out and fix broken links in real-time, address slow load times, and customize for mobile-friendliness.
Plan for cart abandonment—Based on 2023 research, 19% of shoppers abandoned their carts, while another 15% let their product lie in the cart until a favorable price was achieved. Keep building on those customer experience relationships daily.
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Final thoughts
This is an election year and it's telling from the onset. Election campaign ads have spent huge sums on presidential races, school board elections, and local ballot initiatives across several media channels. This has made it harder for retail ads to stand out as they are crowded out by the ad blitz bombarding their prospective customers. Brands that have built traction leading to BFCM instead optimized messaging through email, TikTok, sms, or on the website.
New customers will drop in for that one-time offer while others will become monthly visitors. To that end, online stores can integrate AI sales chatbots like Lookfor to simplify the buying and checkout process. You can deploy other forms of automation to simplify test runs before BFCM. Email triggers can send out promos for minor holidays like Labor Day or July 4.
