How will you spend Black Friday this year?
Will you be out holiday shopping, circling the lot at the mall looking for a place to park? Or, will you be snug at home, surfing the web for Black Friday bargains that later will be delivered to your door?
New research indicates that more and more consumers prefer the second choice –and I think that tells us something important about how the customer experience is changing. Today’s empowered consumers have more options than ever before, and these days holiday shopping doesn’t require the added expense (gas, parking) and hassle (crowded stores, lines at the register) of visiting brick-and-mortar stores. Instead, many consumers now are opting for the convenience of at-home, online shopping.
For proof, let’s take a look at the results from a few recent studies.
Even though a poll from Ipsos Public Affairs showed that nearly half of U.S. adults (45 percent) plan to spend less this coming holiday season than they did last year, eMarketer estimates that U.S. retail ecommerce holiday-season sales, which include all retail ecommerce sales during November and December, will rise 16.8 percent , topping out at a whopping $46.7 billion for 2011. As eMarketer puts it, overall retail sales during the same period are expected to be “lackluster” by comparison.
Other results echo these findings and suggest that the deep penetration of mobile devices may bolster this trend even more.
For instance, Prosper Mobile Insights polled 329 smartphone and tablet users last month, and the data showed that:
- Six in ten (61.7 percent) of those polled said they plan to use their smartphone or tablet for holiday shopping this year. Most (60.8 percent) plan to use their device to purchase products and compare prices. The remaining 39.2 percent said they will use their device as an organizer to keep track of gifts, budgets, sales, etc.
- On average, those who will use a smartphone or tablet for holiday shopping said they plan to make more than one-third (37.9 percent) of their holiday purchases from their device.
- Among the survey respondents who plan to holiday shop with a mobile device, the majority (56.7 percent) anticipates using their device mostly during the planning and research stage. Others (40.2 percent) plan to use their device mainly during the shopping/in-store stage, while 3.1 percent plan to use a smartphone or tablet mostly to share their shopping experiences with others.
Prosper Mobile Insights also looked at when these mobile users be shopping for holiday bargains. Survey participants who will use a smartphone or tablet to shop said they will be “somewhat or very likely” to purchase products on:
- Thanksgiving Day: 30.1 percent
- Black Friday: 66.9 percent
- Saturday after Thanksgiving: 58.6 percent
- Sunday after Thanksgiving: 48.6 percent
- Cyber Monday: 63.5 percent
Note that three in 10 don’t mind shopping on Thanksgiving Day and many (if not most) plan to buy throughout the long holiday weekend. It’s going to be very interesting to see how the results from Black Friday shake out. I think we’re going to see more and more shoppers exercising their option to choose the approach that best suits their needs. If the brick-and-mortar experience is worth traveling for, they’ll go. If not, they’ll stay home and shop online. And that’s more confirmation that as marketers, we need to reach out across all channels with integrated messages that engage prospects and customers wherever and whenever they are ready to buy.
About Colleen Petitt
