Make the most of Black Friday with PDM

Introduction

Black Friday is a time of year that all marketers prepare for and anticipate with great hopes of making interesting content. The goal of this event is to boost sales and attract new customers who will hopefully go on to become long-term buyers of the products/services.

Online marketing is crucial especially for Black Friday as most of the sales during this period come from eCommerce. Looking at pre and post covid numbers during the Black Friday sales period in-store sales have been ⅓ the size of online sales. In 2021 only 17% of Black Friday sales were made in stores.

Source (https://www.statista.com/statistics/945217/black-friday-purchase-channels-united-kingdom-uk/)

Despite successful promotions driving sales eCommerce brands always strive for more. PDM (programmatic direct mail), might therefore be the perfect solution to their marketing strategy over the periods.

Black Friday sales figures across the UK

With the knowledge that a majority of Black Friday sales are going to be made online, it is crucial that e-commerce websites and firms plan adequately, with the right channels. With £9.4 billion being spent on Black Friday in 2021 and potentially, even more, being spent this year it is even more critical to make your customers aware of your Black Friday deals.

The UK makes up nearly 10% of all Black Friday sales globally, with Statista estimating that the average female plans on spending roughly £190 during Black Friday and Cyber Monday whereas the average male in the UK plans on spending £335 during Black Friday. With such a high planned spend period it is a race against time to gain your target audience’s attention before any competitors are able to do so.

Another Important statistic that e-commerce retailers might be interested inis the percentage of consumers intending on making a purchase in physical stores on Black Friday across the UK.

Source (https://www.statista.com/statistics/945121/black-friday-interest-united-kingdom-uk-by-age/)

Regardless of the target demographic, only a small portion of the population is going to be looking to make their Black Friday purchases in person. This then puts more pressure on e-commerce to perform well and for marketers and attract customers to their e-commerce platforms/websites.

Classic Black Friday marketing

A classic approach to Black Friday is simply to mass promote the key sales discounts that will occur onsite during this period. Whilst this marketing approach has its place it isn’t much of an effective marketing strategy as it is rather generic and lacks personalisation.

Some classic Black Friday marketing techniques might include giving out free samples, using market channels that aren’t used too often throughout the year (SMS) and increasing spending on social media targeting. These strategies are employed by most companies and continue to increase in cost with every year that passes.

Having Black Friday-themed posts on social media, changing your landing page to something that lists your Black Friday deals and maybe even mailing out catalogues or offers to consumers isn’t necessarily going to have great engagement and might not provide the expected results when it comes to sales. These broad and non-personalised actions are going to make current customers aware of the discounts and deals that the firm is offering. However, without a form of personalisation, these campaigns aren’t going to convert as many customers as they would if they were targeted.

PDM opportunities for Black Friday

Programmatic direct mail is an excellent way to connect with consumers in a very personal and engaging manner, especially during Black Friday. A lot of Black Friday marketing will be overlooked for various reasons.

Firstly the overuse of certain channels. For most businesses which might use email marketing Black Friday could become difficult. With all other e-commerce retailers also flooding the inboxes of consumers around this period of the year. This will result in a significant number of emails being sent to the bin, marked as spam or ignored by consumers.

Another reason that Black Friday marketing might be performing poorly is that it isn’t personalised enough. Consumers that are being offered products and services that have little to no correlation to their previous purchases or are poorly timed will also fail to cause conversions.

This leads to the opportunities that Paperplanes can provide.

Abandoned basket, next best purchase

Paperplanes might be your solution to a successful Black Friday. Paperplanes could be your point of introduction into direct mailing marketing or it could be the innovative spark to make your direct mailing more effective in terms of ROI, cost of consumer acquisition and increased response rates and conversions.

Timing is the advantage Paperplanes’ programmatic direct mail marketing provides. Mailing consumers when they’ve left abandoned baskets and offering consumers the best next purchase for their recent acquisitions with your company will help you boost Black Friday sales. Paperplanes ensures personalised marketing for each client’s customers, whilst avoiding the pitfalls of being perceived as spam due to lack of relevance.

It is vital to seize the opportunity with this next upcoming Black Friday, with the highest estimated sales since it began!t. Get in touch with us below to scope out the perfect strategy.