Online spending for Cyber Week (the sales period of five days from Thanksgiving through to the following Monday) is expected to total $37.2 billion.
According to Adobe Analytics data, online spend for the week increased by 5.5% year-on-year, with Cyber Monday, the biggest shopping day of the year, bringing in $12.4 billion (+9.6%). Thanksgiving Day drove a record 5.6 billion (+5.5%), while Black Friday also broke records at $9.8 billion (+7.5%).
The discount-heavy period was expected to drive spending as consumers sought out reductions following high inflation rates pushing up prices over the past year, driving up “Buy Now Pay Later” habits to an all-time high on Cyber Monday in the process, at around $7.3 billion (+14%).
During the peak hours of 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. ET, consumers spent $15.7 million every minute.
Criteo found the top performing categories this year to be luggage and bags, toys and games, furniture, apparel and accessories, and hardware.
“An uncertain demand environment pushed retailers to deliver big discounts this season, while also fortifying their ecommerce services with flexible payment methods, better personalization and enhanced mobile functionality” said Vivek Pandya, lead analyst at Adobe Digital Insights. “Consumers have taken note and spent at record rates during the big shopping days, despite dealing with rising costs in other parts of their lives.”
Based on a survey of 7,200 global retailers and brands, Criteo also found the consumer mood in the U.K. to have strengthened, with Black Friday sales up by 280% compared with October.
“With strong sales across product categories, retailers that offer online deals in addition to in-store offers are the clear winners of this sales event. However, Black Friday deals should not exist in a vacuum. Retailers must continue to offer competitive deals through the end of the year to drive conversions while consumers remain eager to shop and hunt for the best deal. By executing this strategy, retailers and brands can turn one-time shoppers into loyal, long-term customers,” explained Brian Gleason, chief revenue officer at Criteo.
According to Shopify numbers, the average cart price globally had reached $106.86, with point-of-sale purchases increasing by one-third (33%) in the U.S. and by 28% in the U.K. compared with last year. For Black Friday alone, Shopify merchants sold $4.1 billion globally ($4.2 million per minute), an increase of 22% in sales.
Shopify Merchants drove 4.1b in sales this Black Friday. Up 22% from last year 💪
Amazing job entrepreneurs. https://t.co/9W7kcEdynM pic.twitter.com/eEgHyBXZUY
— tobi lutke (@tobi) November 25, 2023
Shopify found that for Cyber Monday, the top categories for orders were cosmetics, shirts and tops, underwear and socks, pants, fitness and nutrition, with almost three-quarters (74%) of sales being completed by mobile and the rest through desktop.
“We’re already blown away by the energy of Cyber Monday—the momentum of the holiday season is not slowing down with people showing up for the brands they love in a big way,” Shopify president Harley Finkelstein said.
Advertisers still face wasted digital spend issues
And while news of heightened ad spend is perhaps good for media platforms and agencies, it is also an opportunity for evolving a first-party data drive ahead of 2024’s planned curb of third-party cookies by Google.
According to Phil Duffield, vice president of U.K. for The Trade Desk, 80% of consumers turned to digital channels to shop during Black Friday, while more than one-half (53%) will do so during the holidays and 51% on Boxing Day.
“This is a marketer’s dream; these retailers will have access to first-party data to inform advertisers who is most likely to buy their products. This allows marketers to deliver their ads to the right people with precision and scale across their preferred channels. The advertisers that take a data-driven approach, reduce wasted media spend and ensure that they’re offering a positive experience are the ones who will win this festive season.”
Wasted media spend remains a major problem for advertisers, though, during the “Golden Quarter” especially. According to new research from creative technology company CreativeX—which assessed over 3.9 million ads from 2021 through 2022, from 400+ brands across 10 different industries—brands spent over $600 million worldwide on ads that went to waste during those holiday seasons.
Based on Dentsu’s forecasted digital ad spend for 2023 of $424.3 billion, 30% of which will occur during the fourth quarter, CreativeX has also forecast that $73 billion will be wasted in Q4 2023.
“The majority of this waste is a result of ads that do not meet creative best practices—they are unbranded, sized incorrectly, too long or too short for the platform they are set to appear on, or lack appropriate subtitles,” Mark Piesanen, chief revenue officer at CreativeX, explained to Adweek.
“Marketers face this problem year-long, but it’s exacerbated during high-pressure seasons like the holidays,” he added.