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As summer comes to an end, we’re beginning to catch our first glimpses of fall. Maybe it’s the turn of the weather or the refresh of energy that comes with a well-deserved holiday, but this time of the year always brings with it an air of rejuvenation that we believe is worth taking advantage of as an eCommerce brand.
Not only will this fall motivation have you feeling energized to optimize your brand’s online performance, it’s also the perfect time to get ahead with planning for the busy season on the horizon. Yes, we’re talking about the uptick in online traffic that you should expect this Black Friday, particularly with the 2020 eCommerce trends that we’ve seen in the wake of the COVID outbreak.
In this blogpost, we’ll be discussing why this Black Friday could have a huge impact on your eCommerce sales – if you play your cards right. That means integrating high-converting technology, like User Generated Content, into your site today rather than rushing in November to present a flawless eCommerce on Black Friday.
To ensure that your brand will convert your influx of holiday customers, we’d like to help you get yourself prepared ahead of time.
It’s no secret that Black Friday and the months that follow it make up one of the most fruitful times of the year for eCommerce brands.
In 2019, Adobe Analytics found that online spending jumped by 19.6% on Black Friday with a record-breaking $7.4 billion spent online. This comes with a 6.2% drop in visits to physical stores compared to the year before, implying that shoppers are getting more accustomed to reaching for their computers, phones, and tablets to scour the latest deals even on the biggest shopping days of the year.
We’re talking about 93.2 million online shoppers on Black Friday alone. And this doesn’t even account for Cyber Monday (a record breaking $9.4 billion was spent online last year), as well as the rest of the busy holiday period to follow.
Not to mention that these numbers are all from 2019 – a relatively ‘normal’ year in comparison to 2020. Since the start of this year, we’ve basically seen an online shopping revolution, as the COVID-19 outbreak pushed the world online.
Black Friday represents our first big shopping milestone since the COVID-19 quarantines hit back in March 2020. With many people across the world choosing to remain at home this year, are you prepared for the level of traffic that eCommerce brands are projected to see in November and December?
The Coronavirus pandemic rocked the world, forcing people around the globe into their homes where many fully relied on the internet for work, entertainment, and – you guessed it – shopping.
Although there has been some drop in online sales since the reopening of retailers over the summer, Adobe Analytics still expects 2020 online sales to surpass the total sales of 2019 by October 5, 2020. That’s some major growth – we’re talking a 55% growth in online sales (a total of $66.3 billion) in July 2020 as compared to July 2019.
In fact, just one week of the pandemic (April 22 – April 28, 2020) brought in 22% more sales than the week of Black Friday in 2019 (November 29 – December 5, 2019), with 59% more product page views. And, as the convenience of online shopping becomes more ingrained in our culture because of the COVID experience, online retailers should only expect to see more traffic.
While we may be seeing the opening of more brick and mortar stores throughout the year, it’s hard to say what the future holds at any given moment in 2020. Even Walmart has announced that they will be closed on Thanksgiving due to safety concerns, a historic step which could set a precedent that pushes the public to cautiously shop from within the comfort of their homes.
The unpredictability of the situation means that the only thing we can do is be prepared for the biggest online Black Friday yet. For brands, that means optimizing their online stores to convert.
That’s why you should integrate User Generated Content comes in. UGC technology, which enables brands to collect customer content from social media and integrate it within the online shopping journey, is proven to be an impactful way to convert customers once they hit your eCommerce store because it helps brands:
The benefits of including a high-converting technology into your eCommerce like UGC can truly be seen in the numbers. With a 15% increase of conversion rate on average across industries, UGC can help brands feel confident going into this holiday season.
And if you aren’t yet prepared to convert the rush of online shoppers to come on Black Friday, don’t worry there’s still time.
Lucky for us, we’re still a few months away from the overwhelming pre-holiday weeks of late hours and rushing to make sure that everything is ready. Which means now is the perfect time to fully consider how you can inspire your customers with authentic User Generated Content.
A User Generated Content platform, like Flowbox, enables eCommerce brands to collect and moderate images and videos featuring their products that have been posted by users on social media. This content then uploads directly into a dynamic carousel or gallery along the online shopping journey, creating a more compelling and inspiring buying process.
Take the example of KARL LAGERFELD, who’s connecting with customers at the first touchpoint with their homepage lookbook filled with genuine UGC.
When users interact with one of the User Generated images, they’re brought directly to the product that appears within it, making the journey from browsing the latest styles to owning them a snap!
This idea can also be leveraged on your product pages. That way shoppers can imagine how a specific product would fit into their life based on the happy experiences of others. Lear more about how KARL LAGERFELD increased its average order value increase and conversion rate of people who interacted with UGC.
With the relevance of social media in our post-COVID world, it only makes sense to give your customers the same authentic style that they would find on Instagram – directly in your store. And the real kicker? It actually works!
We’ve seen high conversion and interaction rates for brands across industries thanks to their UGC integrations…
And if you don’t see your industry here, browse our case studies to see for yourself how UGC can help turn your Black Friday traffic into conversions.
In the case of holiday eCommerce preparation, there’s no use waiting until the end of October to integrate the latest high-converting technology into your site. Schedule a demo now, so that you can put your best foot forward before the busy season kicks into high gear.
