Black Friday Hub: Amazing Marketing Ideas to Nail Your Big Day in 2023

The global COVID-19 pandemic has changed the future of Black Friday when there are more and more deal seekers are queueing in virtual stores. If you’re an online merchant, you’d better be hard at work figuring out a winning Black Friday marketing strategy to entice customers into your sales funnels.

But fret not cause we’ve got your back! In this article, we’ll give you a super digestible guide on everything you need to prepare for your Black Friday marketing strategy as well as outline some evergreen Black Friday marketing ideas which you can employ in 2023. But first, let’s craft the main ideas of the article:

• Best Black Friday Marketing Strategies in 2023
• Black Friday Marketing Trends in 2023
• Crucial Black Friday Preparations

Before Black Friday 2023, make sure that your e-store is running on a powerful and stable eCommerce platform. If not, it’s high time you considered switching to a brand new one.

Having successfully delivered thousands of projects, LitExtension is proud to be the world #1 shopping cart migration expert. With LitExtension, you can easily migrate to 200+ eCommerce platforms, including some of the most popular names such as Shopify, WooCommerce, and Magento.

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6 Best Black Friday Marketing Strategies in 2022

We’ve collected some of the best Black Friday marketing ideas that can inspire your campaign. Without further ado, let’s get this show on the road!

#1 Get Started with Black Friday Email Marketing

Every business owner should have a few Black Friday email marketing strategies planned to bring customers back to your site so they can act on your Black Friday sales offers.

Whether you’ve already planned, created or scheduled your Black Friday email marketing campaign, you can find a wealth of helpful knowledge in our “Holiday Email Marketing: Best Practices and Case Study Analysis” webinar.

Below is the full version of the webinar, check it out!

But if you’re in a rush, look below for some helpful holiday email marketing tips:

• Send warm-up emails in the weeks run-up to Black Friday with hints or teasers: Whether your Black Friday offer is a special discount up to 70%, an exclusive product or a totally unique promotion, start teasing it early to your subscribers so they’re on the lookout for the announcement.
• Create abandoned cart emails: Before Black Friday, make sure you have emailed visitors who abandon their carts. An automatically triggered email will help capture some of those abandoned conversions.
• Give a sincere thanks to your clients as the sale ends: A follow-up email to thank them for choosing you is always a nice touch. The ideal time to have an automated thank you email is 5-7 days after sales are over.

#2 Boost Black Friday Sales via Social Media & SMS

Social Media Marketing

Social media, without a doubt, plays an integral part in a Black Friday marketing strategy.

Black Friday 2021 and the holiday shopping season this year are going to feel very different. Last year, the world went through an incredible learning phase with eCommerce, and this year those practices, and more, are going to be expected by consumers.

Nik Sharma, CEO of Sharma Brands

Hence, you need to highlight your brand identity by telling a unique story, one that shoppers recognize right away, even without excessive copy or slogans. Your look, feel, tone and voice on social media platforms should all authentically represent your brand and your customer community.

Keep in mind that today’s customers spend much of their free time surfing the newsfeed on social platforms like Facebook, Instagram or TikTok on mobiles. So that, don’t miss out the chance to create some mobile campaigns for Black Friday.

If you haven’t already, now is the time to try new things! Draft some Black Friday promotion ideas and craft Black Friday social media campaigns in order to get your brand in good stead for the competitive battle ahead.

SMS Marketing

Speaking of Black Friday marketing strategy, we’ve mentioned email marketing and social media marketing. Are we missing out on any other Black Friday best practices? Yes, it would be a huge mistake if we ignore Black Friday SMS marketing.

As much to your surprise, no other type of eCommerce marketing method has as high a saturation rate as SMS does. Emerging research finds that eCommerce text messages have an insanely high open rate of 99% – with most consumers opening the text message within 90 seconds of receiving it.

SMS makes it easy for shoppers to engage and purchase directly from the messages they receive. During Black Friday and Cyber Monday, limited-time offers are tried-and-true tactics for SMS. The immediacy of a Black Friday text message encourages customers to act right away.

By the way, LitExtension has recently collaborated with SimiCart – the top-rated expert in mobile commerce, to host the webinar “Winning Black Friday Strategies For Mobile Shopping Apps”. Let’s take your time to grab some tips and tricks for your Black Friday marketing strategy!

#3 Up-sell & Cross-sell with Discounts

Up-selling persuades customers to buy an upgraded or more expensive version as an alternative to the product they choose. Whereas, cross-selling encourages shoppers to purchase supplementary products that are relevant to the ones added to the shopping cart.

Here, we’ve gathered the two examples of up-selling vs cross-selling so that you can clearly tell the differences between the two in Black Friday sales strategy.

Both upselling and cross-selling are great ways to take full advantage of selling more and eventually increase average order value. Thus, if you’re not offering up-sells and cross-sells in your Black Friday marketing strategy this year, you’re going to miss out on extra sales you could be making on every single order.

For example, for Black Friday deal ideas, you can create combos of 3 to 5 complementary products that go well together and offer the whole package to customers at a discount on the total. These kinds of combo promotions work very well in the sales season as Black Friday and Cyber Monday, when people are actively finding package deals for a better price.

#4 Do Video Marketing

Video is an easy-to-digest format that gives our eyes a rest from the overabundance of textual information online. Therefore, more and more brands are elevating their Black Friday marketing strategy by incorporating video-based content.

However, when it comes to video marketing, many business owners tend to think of it as a costly, complicated method. In fact, it’s quite the opposite.

You can produce high-quality, interesting Black Friday videos without overspending your marketing budget. There’s no need for professional video photographers or expensive equipment. In most cases, all you need to have is a unique idea and a smartphone!

If you’re a beginner in video editing, you can use online tools such as PCMag and Clipchamp.

Or if you want to create videos on your phone, you can use apps such as video maker for business, Inshot, and Filimorago. Although mobile apps offer fewer editing options than online video editing tools, they are ideal for short videos such as YouTube shorts or Instagram stories.

But here’s where it gets even better: Don’t limit yourself to visuals alone! Incorporate text to speech narration to introduce an enchanting auditory layer to your videos. This captivating addition not only further engages your audience but also ignites your Black Friday marketing with newfound vigor.

Black Friday Video Marketing Ideas

• Highlight your holiday promotions: This kind of video can as short as a teaser, no longer than 30 seconds. It’s simply a short video to introduce your best Black Friday deals. Make sure you turn to some video editing apps to add some visuals and effects.
• Share gift guides: BFCM is also a gift-giving season, meaning many consumers are shopping for their family members and friends. Thus, you can shoot a video featuring items that you recommend as ideal holiday gifts. Remember to explain the reason why these items are great gifts and who they would be suitable for.
• Educate your clients with a holiday twist: You can never go wrong with an educational video. Let’s combine valuable information for your recipients and some tips related to the season in this video.
• Thank your clients: During such a hectic time like BFCM, customers are bombarded with hundreds of deals and discounts from multiple brands. Let’s come and rescue them from the BFCM craze with a sweet thank-you video. Give them sincere thanks for sticking with you through the year 2023 and wish them all the best in the following year 2024. Spread some love!

#5 Entice Customers with Freebies

Do you like freebies whenever you buy something both in brick-and-mortar and online stores? I bet you do. We do. And so does everyone!

Black Friday and Cyber Monday are golden opportunities to attract new clienteles with giveaways and free items.

Moreover, with how many competitors you’ll be battling with to win the attention of your customers, a free prize draw, a competition or  a giveaway Black Friday post can do wonders in driving more traffic to your website. Now, let’s see some Black Friday marketing strategy examples.

Here’s another giveaway Black Friday marketing strategy example from Tree Hut – a U.S body scrub brand on how they create a Black Friday interactive post. Let’s take a look!

As you can see, entrants have to like the post, follow @treehut and leave a comment to share about their favorite scent. With these Black Friday marketing tips, the brand can increase follower accounts and spark social media engagement.

However, you’ve also got to be aware that shoppers who are more active during BFCM season require different approaches to your loyal everyday customers. While freebies and samples are great to attract new clients, you should offer loyalty reward programs to maintain your year-round customers.

#6 Highlight Return Policy

Black Friday marketing strategy is sometimes stressful for business owners. But this time is also frantic for shoppers as well. To provide your customers with 5-star customer service, be a detail-oriented business that goes above and beyond the call of duty for your customers.

During Black Friday and Cyber Monday, consumers are buying in a hurry. The sales cycles are substantially shortened and they don’t have enough time to do a bit of research. Your job is to make them feel comfortable making a snap decision free – and it is when your return policy shines.

To craft perfect Black Friday marketing campaigns, make sure your return policy is clear on product pages or the checkout process. Besides, you can consider offering a refund where feasible. It can help to convince on-the-fence clients to pull the trigger as you’re showing confidence in your products and services.

Now, you’ve got our 6 unique Black Friday ideas for eCommerce! However, to brilliantly execute your marketing strategies, don’t forget to catch the latest Black Friday marketing trends ahead of BFCM 2022!

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4 Black Friday Marketing Trends 2022

#1 BFCM Shopping Starts Earlier & Ends Later

The current BFCM trend is that more and more stores are starting their BFCM deals earlier and extending their deals after BFCM week has ended. If you’re dismissing this trend, you’re likely to miss out on lots of sales!

As a merchant, this means you have an opportunity to launch pre-BFCM offers, garner interest and scoop up some of the early-bird bargain hunter revenue as well as design a post-Black Friday marketing strategy to convert shoppers who by some chance missed your previous offers.

Even if you have no intention of extending your sales, post-Black Friday is still an ideal time to tighten your brand-customer relationship. We love the idea of sending your clients a personalized thank you note to sincerely thank them for sticking with you through such a difficult year and wish them a new year full of joy and happiness.

#2 Multichannel Marketing Remains Effective

The more nets you have in the water, the more likely you are to catch a fish. So, what else do we have for Black Friday 2022 trends? By promoting your BFCM deals via all of your marketing channels, you provide your consumers with additional touch points to discover your brand and holiday deals.

For instance, you can boost Black Friday sales via SMS, email marketing and social media. While SMS is the traditional method to let your customers know about your deals, email and social media are where your creative juices flow. Additionally, if you are a crypto startup preparing for the Black Friday, you can also craft and share crypto press releases to announce special promotions and cryptocurrency deals.

#3 Shoppers Love Instant Support

According to Shopify, businesses that responded to a customer’s message within 5 minutes were 70% more likely to convert a customer.

BFCM shopping is a fast-moving experience. Customers won’t have much time to search for the information they need and they won’t wait long for a response to any question they might have regarding your products or services.

And in the absence of in-person customer service, live chat turns out to be the best method for customers to get help through instant messaging platforms. Thus, consider implementing live chat support in your Black Friday marketing strategy to speed up your response time and improve the shopping experience for your shoppers.

#4 Customers Value Sustainability

Let’s come to the final idea in Black Friday trends 2022 – Sustainable eCommerce. BFCM season is often synonymous with wasteful consumerism. However, the good news is shoppers are beginning to pay attention to how to reduce the impact on the environment. This shift in shopping behavior has been reported in news and media in recent years, forcing many brands to take action too.

But don’t worry too much as going green doesn’t mean you have to overspend your Black Friday marketing budget. Also, you don’t have to flip the switch overnight.

Here are some green initiatives for brands to apply:

• Reduce packaging waste by opting for eco-friendly packaging that’s 100% recyclable or reusable.

• Encourage customers to get items delivered to their offices, neighbors’ homes, or depots, in case they know they won’t be home. This helps to eliminate repeat delivery attempts that add to the carbon footprint.
• Write detailed product descriptions (more on this below) and provide interactive size guides to reduce returns as much as possible.

By now, you’ve had 2022 BFCM trends under your belt. Bear in mind that if you haven’t made adequate preparations for your Black Friday marketing strategy, you are unlikely to succeed. So, be well prepared!

Failing to prepare is preparing to fail

Benjamin Franklin.

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3 Crucial Black Friday Preparations

In preparation for the Black Friday bonanza, you’ve probably made some logistical changes to your business to ensure you’re ready for the influx of orders that could hit your store. Maybe you’ve upped your stock levels, made your packaging system watertight, and hired additional staff. But have you thought about optimizing your site?

Here, we’ve listed a few essential tasks you can perform right now.

#1 Test Your Website Speed

Speed equals revenue. A slow-loading page doesn’t just try visitors’ patience. It can be the customer experience failure that costs you a sale. And through the Black Friday season, a website should be giving high conversion rates, not high bounce rates.

There are lots of tools available that you can use to test your site for speed. Google’s PageSpeed Insights and GTMetrix are perhaps the two most popular. For each tool, you only need to enter your site’s URL and have it analyzed for speed and other optimization factors.

But what if you’ve already tried out these tools but your site is still slow to load, prone to downtime, and lacks business-crucial functions? If that’s your case, maybe it’s time to make some imperative changes – migrate to a more robust eCommerce platform.

We all fear changes. That’s why we keep postponing though we know what our business needs is a new home. But when it comes to BFCM season, the price you pay for procrastination is enormous – thousands of sale losses and poor customer experience.

But things don’t have to be that way if you choose to go with LitExtension – the world #1 shopping cart migration expert. At LitExtension, we promise a smooth data migration with 100% uptime, SEO preserved and a high level of accuracy and security.

Let LitExtension take all the hassles out of your re-platforming project so that you can fully prepare for this BFCM season.

#2 Optimize Product Pages

If one thing is true about Black Friday shoppers, it’s that they’re in a hurry. They want you to get straight to the point and make the copy scannable so they can make a rational decision quickly.

Here, product description is an essential criterion. Therefore, product descriptions should be written in short sentences, preferably using bullet points to emphasize the most important features.

However, being short doesn’t mean that product descriptions can’t be detailed – quite the opposite. As online customers can’t touch the product, it’s imperative that you paint a picture for them, making products as tangible as they can be.

An effective product description should follow these below rules:

• Contain power words that sell
• Optimized for search engines
• Include social proof
• Use high-quality, eye-catching product images

This is how Charles & Keith describes their product to their online consumers. Let’s take a glance!

#3 Optimize Checkout Process

During this most hectic shopping season of the year, consumers often feel pressured to get onto a site quickly, search for their items and checkout before moving onto the next site ahead of product sell-outs. So, how can businesses help to improve eCommerce customer experience?

Given how common it is for shoppers to abandon shopping carts, the last thing you want to do is to make your checkout process any more of a hassle than it has to be.

Limit the amount of information that customers have to fill in and the number of steps they need to take to complete their purchase as much as you can and ensure that your checkout page is responsive and easy to navigate to reduce the number of sales you lose to cart abandonment.

For instance, you can implement one-click buying that uses a secure mobile wallet with customers’ information readily available such as Paypal, Google Pay and Apple Pay.

If your eCommerce store is built on such platforms like WooCommerce or Shopify, dynamic checkout buttons are available to create a seamless one-click shopping experience.

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Black Friday Marketing Strategy – FAQs

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Key Takeaways for Black Friday Marketing Strategy

All in all, with these above creative Black Friday marketing ideas for eCommerce for Black Friday marketing strategy, we hope you’ve found some quick wins that you can apply to your business.

Let’s think of this Black Friday 2022 as a learning experience rather than just simply earning revenue. Stay motivated, create bite-sized goals and enjoy every lesson along your eCommerce journey!

By the way, if you need more helpful eCommerce tips and ideas, let’s join our Facebook community!