Well if you hadn’t already heard, tomorrow Friday 27th November 2015 is Black Friday.
This is now a major event in the retail calendar and many might argue the consumer buying public calendar where toys, electricals, gadgets, gizmos and general christmas gifts are sold at seemingly discounted prices. In previous years it’s also seen a flurry of panic buying, fights and even shop closures instore but what entails for the retailers and consumers concentrating with online sales? Will figures rise or fall with the impending website downtime due to high server demand. Well according to Experian-IMRG, online retailers are looking at hitting the £1 billion mark on Black Friday here in the UK!
Currys.co.uk are expecting to take 10 online orders a second. Amazon.co.uk have been slowly building up over a fortnight to the event with pre-sales, especially for their loyal Prime customers giving them priority access to deals. Should the analysts be correct, we’ll see a 32% increase on the sales performance of Black Friday 2014!
So, how do online retailers persuade savvy online customers to part with their cash in just a day? It’s been a series of promotional activities and even consumer engagement with the Black Friday concept that’s generated staggering sales.
Email tactics promoting Black Friday discounts
Online retailers already have many email accounts registered to them and over the last fortnight prominent Black Friday promotional countdowns have started appearing. Whether it’s pre-sale items reduced each day or a simple calendar counting down alongside, the effect seems to be working with consumers who are going to be waiting on-line (pardon the pun) to buy them tomorrow. If you’re an e-tailer and you’ve not used your email campaigns effectively for Black Friday’s build-up, then you’re missing out on a chunk of consumer excitement.
Black Friday online adverts and social media techniques
It’s impossible to currently search or visit news websites without witnessing adverts mentioning Black Friday deals. Even if you visit Facebook and Twitter right now, it seems that every other post or tweet features the words “black”, “friday” or “deal”, not to mention the paid for advertising. Considering that the average person uses social media 1 hour and 20 minutes a day, it’s ridiculous to think that online retailers would not concentrate their efforts on this source and probably now do so more than email marketing to promote their Black Friday deals.
Can online retailers cope with Black Friday demand?
Already, one of the biggest bargain shopping deal websites in the UK, HotUKDeals has tonight (Thursday 26th Nov 2015) collapsed under the pressure of deal hunters that they had to resort to Twitter to ensure they stay informed:
Sorry guys! The HUKD website is having a moment of downtime, It will be back ASAP to carry on with the great #BlackFriday deals! #TeamHUKD
— HotUKDeals (@HotUKDeals) November 26, 2015
Last year currys.co.uk limited the amount of users visiting their website and created a waiting system to keep users in a queue before they could even browse the shop. Whilst the idea appeared to be one to keep their server from breaking, this tactic to most online consumers felt like you were being forced into a sale due to the time restriction before being locked out of the site. However, the tactic worked enough for them to do the same this Black Friday 2015.
It’s ridiculous to think that in this day and age – and after so many Black Friday online server breakdowns in the past few years – that online retailers haven’t already thought about the demand and the impact on their web server. They should have increased their server capacity at the data centre for the next week just to be on the safe side. After all, they’re profits are going to be increased during this period but it will be interesting to see who has tried to cut corners and falls victim to the online Black Friday web surge in traffic.
Need help or advice with your e-commerce website?
Here at Design for Digital we pride ourselves on creating e-commerce website solutions to fit your business model and achieve the sales you deserve. We build them either in Magento for larger catalogues or for start-up shops we use Shopify and have great experience in creating them. Please call Lawrence Tilley directly on 07793 226869 or email [email protected] for more information.
