September 25, 2017
Written by Nilda Cerna, Marketing Manager at Romax Marketing & Distribution.
Historically, the biggest shopping day around the World is Black Friday, which happens on the last Friday of November every year, just after the traditional American Thanksgiving. Everyone has the image of people in the US buying as if the end of the World is coming. Sales are impressive, and have only been outdone by the recently invented singles days on the 11th of November (11.11) in China.
The Black Friday phenomenon is here to stay and it’s going to get bigger in the UK. Above 80% of Britons know what is, compared to the 40% of French.
Black Friday 2016
“Britons spent £5.8 billion over Black Friday and Cyber Monday 2016”
In 2016, Britons spent £5.8 billion over the four days between Black Friday and Cyber Monday – 15% increase compared with 2015. E-commerce business took £2.8 billion – up 20%. On Black Friday itself, £1.27 billion was spent according to estimates of the Centre for Retail Research (CRR) and the website vouchercodes.co.uk.
Online retailers experienced sky-rocketing traffic on their websites, according to the Daily Mirror. Currys PC World reported more than half a million visitors which resulted in 40% more orders. eBay estimated 20.7 million UK visitors in the long Black Friday weekend.
Emails sent on Black Friday 2016
“2.9 billion emails sent on Black Friday and Cyber Monday” MailChimp
The email provider Mailchimp sent over 1.5 billion emails on Black Friday itself and 1.4 billion in Cyber Monday. SendGrid also sent more than 3 billion of emails with an average of 23% Open Rate on both days.
Let’s do the maths, how many emails does a user receive on Black Friday, and over the cyber weekend? It’s not uncommon to hear that consumers start to feel overwhelmed by the huge amount of emails they received. According to Royal Mail MarketReach, 70% of people say, “I feel that I receive too many emails.” As a result, 51% of emails were deleted within two seconds.
How to stand out from the crowd
“Almost 85 percent of retailers will send an email to their customers about Black Friday deals”
The question is how to stand out from the billions of emails send it on Black Friday? The answer may well be by “creating an impact with Direct Mail.”
Marketers need to incorporate Direct Mail as part of their Black Friday campaign because:
- Neuroscience. There is a lot of research that confirms Direct Mail beats email in different aspects, such as, brand recall with 70% higher results, a physical material is considered more “real” to the brain, and consumers internalise printed adverts better than email giving them greater resonance.
- Direct Mail impact on online sales. As a direct result of receiving a direct mail, 92% of people driven to a website and 87% were influenced to make online purchases. Read more information about Direct Mail Facts&Figures here.
There are a lot of types of direct mail, which can help you to create impact, recall your brand and, of course, increase your sales, such as Door-Droops, Letters – Check 349% ROI Case Study, Postcard and Catalogue that you can use to influence your audience. But, the key to printed communication is both, the data management, which help you to target and reduce the cost, and the personalised message, which is more than “dear name”, you can personalise images content and text – check Emma Bridgwater Case Study.
Remember, Black Friday 2017 is on 24th of November. Contact us for a bespoke Direct Marketing solution.
References: Telegraph, Royal Mail MarketReach, Mirror, MailChimp, SendGrid, Hubspot, BBC, US data corporation, 3Bet Media.
Contact us: hello@romax.co.uk +44 (0) 20 8293 8550
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