Still recovering from your Thanksgiving meal? Too busy finding great deals to keep track of the news emerging out of Black Friday and Cyber Monday and how it relates to marketing? This week we’re providing a round up of the milestones, trends, and emerging behaviors driven by the busiest shopping season of the year.
1. U.S. Retail E-Commerce Spending on Black Friday Tops $1 Billion for the First Time
According to comScore, Black Friday e-Commerce sales grew 26% year-over-year in 2012, topping the $1 billion mark for the first time in history. The company found that over 57 million Americans went online to make their purchases during Black Friday, avoiding long lines and traffic getting to stores. Amazon.com had the highest volume of traffic, beating out brick and mortar competitors; Walmart was second in traffic, followed by Best Buy (comScore’s data excluded auction sites like eBay.com). Thanksgiving continued to grow as an important holiday shopping date as well, with e-Commerce sales on Turkey Day growing 32% to $633 million.
2. iPad Powers Mobile Shopping
Mobile shopping left its mark on the Black Friday rush according to data from IBM. Mobile devices accounted for 16.3% of online sales, up from 9.8% in 2011. Nearly a quarter of U.S. consumers visited retail sites from their tablets or smartphones. The real star in mobile shopping for 2012 is Apple’s iPad. The tablet accounted for 10% of all online shopping traffic on Black Friday, while the iPhone accounted for 8.7%. comScore data through Cyber Monday shows that overall mobile sales topped $750 million through the course of the 5-days from Thanksgiving to Cyber Monday.
3. The Apps that Won on Black Friday
Daily deals sites maintained their top spots in the mobile commerce space, but retailer apps saw higher spikes in usage during Black Friday. According to Onavo, a mobile data compression firm that tracked app usage over the holiday, brick and mortar apps from Walmart, Target, and Best Buy saw greater usage on Black Friday than their competitors. With regards to mobile shopping tools, price comparison apps ShopSavvy and eBay’s RedLaser saw tremendous spikes in usage as people comparison shopped before committing to an in-store purchase.
4. Cyber Monday Sales Hit $1.46 Billion
Not to be outdone by Black Friday, Cyber Monday’s sales hit $1.46 billion, underperforming against expectations that it would reach $1.5 billion, but still growing by 30% compared to 2011. Notably, Cyber Monday shopping behavior has begun to shift toward the home. While Cyber Monday is traditionally associated with making purchases at work, purchases at home grew by 4% while purchases at work declined by 3.1% year-over-year.
5. Digital Content & Subscriptions See the Biggest Category Growth
comScore’s sales data also signaled a significant shift in the types of products people are purchasing during the holidays. The biggest category growth for e-Commerce during November was for digital content and subscriptions. With increased growth in smartphone, tablet, and connected TV adoption, sales for digital content and subscriptions grew 29% year-over-year as people turn to downloading content to put on these devices instead of purchasing physical media. Other product categories also seeing the largest e-Commerce growth on Black Friday included: toys (27%), consumer packaged goods (23%), video games and consoles (18%), and consumer electronics (18%).
via Cheat Sheet Special Edition: Black Friday and Cyber Monday | Moxie Pulse.
