Black Friday promotions are an enormous source of e-commerce worldwide.
Today, businesses worldwide acknowledge the significant influence of Black Friday on consumers and the financial and marketing advantages it brings to participating companies.
During Black Friday 2023, global online sales increased by 8% compared to the previous year (2022), reaching a staggering $70.9 billion.
This article explores the key steps for preparing an effective Black Friday communication strategy. We will also dive into various tactics and channels while showcasing leading companies' real-life campaigns to inspire your efforts!
Understanding the Black Friday Phenomenon
The term “Black Friday” has a rich history, it was recorded for the first time in 1869 and applied to the financial crisis. But the first time “Black Friday” specifically referred to shopping the day after Thanksgiving, came in the 1950s. Philadelphia’s police department complained about an influx of people coming to the city to shop that day, calling it a “Black Friday” because they had to control enormous crowds of shoppers. Later during the 1990s, people used to camp outside of stores in anticipation of the best Black Friday deals. Black Friday started as a single day of sales but now has expanded to a shopping extravaganza that may last through the entire week or month of November.
Prepare Your Marketing Strategy
Preparing for Black Friday is vital for business owners, and for that reason creating a comprehensive Black Friday marketing strategy is very important.
Set Clear Goals:
Before delving into the details of your Black Friday marketing campaign, it is crucial to determine your objectives for the Black Friday event and align them with your overall business goals. Are you aiming to:
- Boost sales
- Increase website traffic
- Acquire new customers, or
- Promote specific products
By grasping these broader goals, you can tailor your Black Friday strategy accordingly. Remember to make your Black Friday campaign goals specific and easy to understand. Indefinite goals make it difficult to measure campaign success accurately.
These goals will guide your efforts and help analyze past performance. Leveraging insights from the past such as successful marketing strategies, challenges, customer feedback, and competitor analysis can help you review data from previous Black Friday events to identify trends, successful tactics, and areas for improvement.
Craft Irresistible Offers
Creating enticing deals and discounts is the key to attracting customers to your business. The first thing you can do is decide your goals and deals to create the ultimate Black Friday campaign. Here are some ideas on what type of offers you can promote:
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Flash sales: With countdown timers to create a sense of urgency, you nudge your customers to act right away. It is a proven technique for increasing sales and conversions.
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Free shipping: During Black Friday, free shipping is the best incentive to attract consumers. People tend to overvalue the benefits of “free,” so use this trick to influence their behavior on a psychological level.
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Gifts with purchase: Offering gifts is an enticing means to engage customers and catch their interest. “Buy one get one free,” is a good option to clean up your stock and at the same time attract more consumers.
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Product bundles: Product bundles are tempting for consumers and can increase the average order value for businesses.
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Loyalty discounts: Loyalty customers will buy your products even in periods that are not offered at a discount, or they will be recommending your brand to others. This is a good reason to offer them exceptional discounts or coupons to reward them for their loyalty and trust.
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Personalized and targeted offers for specific customer segments: Personalized and targeted offers are the most significant offers during Black Friday. They can increase revenue by improving customer satisfaction and loyalty.
Create a BF Content Calendar
Develop a well-organized “Black Friday content calendar” to maximize your business's impact during this busy period.
Outline your marketing activities, including email campaigns, social media posts, blog posts, SMS marketing, Viber marketing, and advertisements. Take advantage of Apifon’s downloadable Black Friday calendar to enhance your marketing efforts.
Schedule your marketing activities in advance to get ahead of the Black Friday competition game.
Craft Compelling Messaging:
During Black Friday consumers will receive a plethora of promotional emails. Your business is not the only one that wants to benefit from the Black Friday sales event. This is an important reason for you to stand out from the competition and craft compelling messages that resonate with your audience's desires. What you must do is develop a persuasive and engaging copy that highlights the benefits of your promotions.
To achieve this, start by understanding your customer's true desires, pain points, and aspirations, and use this insight to shape your messaging. Then infuse your messaging with emotions that cause enthusiasm for the upcoming sales, communicate the value proposition, and create a sense of urgency by using limited-time offers making potential buyers take immediate action. Also, you should personalize messaging with data-driven insights for an unforgettable shopping experience.
Creating compelling messages that resonate with your audience is crucial for attracting attendees, generating buzz, and achieving your overall business goals.
Generate Buzz some weeks before
Prepare a strategy for generating buzz to increase customer excitement and acquire potential shoppers.
Create mystery around your brand by generating buzz some weeks before Black Friday:
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Target new customers and ask them to opt-in to receive Black Friday discounts earlier.
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Use phrases to generate buzz such as “Join us for exclusive Black Friday offers and amazing gifts” or “Join our club to learn more about our new Black Friday sales.”
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Implement countdowns or exclusive previews to keep your audience engaged and curious.
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Educate your audience before Black Friday and make them subscribe for exclusive customized content: “Get our guide on how to make the best purchases this Black Friday.”
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Collaborate with influencers or brand ambassadors to help spread the excitement and create a buzz.
Many shoppers conduct market research in the weeks leading up to Black Friday to find the greatest deals and make their purchases early. The pre-Black Friday season starts in early November, so you must be prepared! By crafting teaser campaigns or offering exclusive sneak peeks, you can pique your customers' interest and make them crave more incredible deals from your business.
Choose the right channels for your business.
To create an effective marketing strategy for Black Friday, it's crucial to utilize all available marketing channels. Regardless of your customers' preferred communication platform, delivering unique and engaging experiences across every touchpoint is essential. Leveraging platforms such as email, SMS, and Viber to connect with your customer base can not only extend your reach but also enhance brand recognition and boost sales.
On the dynamic occasion of Black Friday, amidst the flurry of deals and promotions, employing an "omnichannel" approach can truly set your store apart.
By implementing an omnichannel strategy, you can meet your audience on their preferred communication channels, making interactions more convenient and connections stronger. This ensures that your message doesn't get lost in the sea of competing communications, resulting in more meaningful engagement with your audience.
Utilize Email, Viber, and SMS Marketing
Consider all the channels you have available to reach your users and find a way to interrelate with them before promoting your Black Friday deals.
Email marketing
During Black Friday, shoppers pay more attention to their emails because of the unique offers they might be interested in. This is a good reason to prepare a campaign to inform your audience about your Black Friday deals. You can reach numerous potential customers at once by sending out emails with exciting Black Friday deals.
First, send teaser emails to create interest via curiosity just by giving a hint of your upcoming sales.
Then, send exclusive discounts customized for different leads.
You can always benefit from email marketing as it can be an effective way for you to promote Black Friday deals and boost your sales.
Viber business messaging
Leveraging the potential of Viber business messaging can remarkably elevate your Black Friday endeavors. Beyond its cost-effectiveness, Viber presents an array of tools that could significantly amplify your sales prospects.
What sets Viber apart is its rich content, encompassing images, videos, GIFs, interactive polls, well-crafted texts, and even audio messages. This dynamic blend effectively translates into higher conversion rates and meaningful customer engagement.
As you prepare for the busy Black Friday, think of Viber's tools as an important part of your marketing plan.
SMS Marketing
SMS emerges as a competitive advantage on Black Friday, providing a vital channel of communication with your audience.
Amidst the bustling Black Friday rush, SMS shines as a potent tool for magnifying impact and effectively seizing your audience's attention. In an increasingly crowded digital landscape, SMS offers a distinct opportunity to engage with your customers in a more personal and immediate manner. Among the array of advantages that SMS contributes to your Black Friday strategy, a prominent one is ensuring your most valued customers promptly receive updates on your top deals of the year. By employing SMS messages, you can seamlessly reach customers through their preferred devices—mainly their mobile phones, which they rely on for purchases.
Additionally, SMS opens the door to two-way conversations, allowing you to address any shopping inquiries promptly and efficiently.
Real-life examples of successful campaigns
Email marketing campaigns
Apple’s email marketing campaign
Apple launched a teaser email campaign to build anticipation and pique their customers’ interest. At the same time, Apple gave information about its upcoming offers and the time they will take place to encourage consumers to make their purchases as soon as possible.
Columbia’s email marketing campaign
They started by saying that Black Friday sales are live, and customers must take advantage of them.
What’s better than a sale? Receiving rewards! During Black Friday Columbia offered members $25 as a reward for every $100 they spend, plus free shipping. They also highlighted their best Black Friday offers available for different leads, with sales up to 50% off and free shipping on orders that exceed $125. What is more important is that they included a clear CTA!
Viber Campaign
Sephora’s Viber Campaign
Sephora made an impactful Black Friday move by offering free shipping for all purchases and sales up to 50% off on selected products, which is a significant discount compared to their competitors. Sephora always takes advantage of Viber’s rich content, which makes their campaigns unforgettable!
SMS Campaign
Pura Vida
Pura Vida (Bracelets) sent subscribers a pre–Black Friday text message giving them exclusive early access to their Black Friday deals. For Black Friday Pura Vida used a segmentation strategy and drove remarkable results.
Leverage Customer Data and Segmentation
Customer data is an asset that can help you create personalized offers and messages for your audience. By using customer data on the busiest shopping day of the year (Black Friday), companies can gain valuable insights into the mindset of consumers and deliver personalized experiences that satisfy customers and increase loyalty, retention, and conversion rates.
How to leverage customer data to create personalized offers and messages?
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Segment your customers.
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Use customer data to create customer personas.
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Apply personalization techniques to your offers and messages.
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Provide targeted interactions. Customer data allows marketers to understand where consumers are engaging with their brand and leverage this interaction to gain more information from their target buyers.
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Test your offers and messages to measure their performance on your customers’ actions. By using A/B testing, multivariate or split testing you can compare diverse types of offers and messages and see which one performs better.
Overall, segmentation is vital for delivering relevant content to different customer groups. By knowing the unique needs, preferences, and behaviors of each segment you can deliver purposeful messages that resonate with every customer, improving the number of your clients and revenue.
Automate Your Campaigns
Advocate the use of marketing automation to create breathtaking Black Friday campaigns. If you want to target your Black Friday shoppers with personalized messages and offers tailored to their needs, you need to use the power of marketing automation.
A huge advantage of automation is that it can save time, reduce errors, and ensure timely delivery of messages. Especially in Black Friday season it is important to make sure of the delivery of your business messages.
Apifon is here to help you make sure that your message will be delivered. Apifon’s Campaign failover features will give your messages the ability to switch to another communication channel in cases the primary communication channel fails to deliver a message.
For example, when subscribers do not receive or open your email, within the time you have set, they will automatically receive the version of the SMS message you have designed. “Apifon’s platform will never let you down even in such a busy season!”
Post-Black Friday Analysis and Follow-Up
To plan successful online campaigns, it is important to analyze and test website metrics, sales data, and online customer behavior. This analysis helps determine the popularity of certain aspects. For instance, to evaluate the efficacy of Black Friday campaigns, Google Analytics should be utilized, trackable URLs should be created, Black Friday discount codes should be generated, and email sign-up forms should be counted to measure the level of engagement with the target audience. However, the key to maintaining customer engagement is follow-up communication.
To ensure your business is fully prepared for Black Friday, you must take several critical steps. You must develop a comprehensive marketing strategy, create irresistible deals, build hype and anticipation, automate your campaigns, leverage customer data, and provide adequate training for your team.
However, the most crucial factor in achieving success and maximizing profits on Black Friday is utilizing Viber, SMS, and Email Marketing as Business Messaging tools. Make sure to take advantage of these powerful tools to ensure your business thrives during this critical shopping event.
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