Divvit 2017 Holiday Data Report - Black Friday and the Holiday Season: Reports - Webflow
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Black Friday and the Holiday Season:
Divvit 2017 Holiday
Data Report
ReportsReports
Black Friday and the Holiday Season:
November Explodes in 2017
When huge ecommerce shopping events occur, we like to take a look at our data and see
what conclusions we can come to. The Black Friday kickoff to the holiday season in 2017
was one of the most impressive days we’ve seen yet.
When looking through our data, we noticed clear trends with our aggregated merchant
analytics that seemed to debunk all the expectations we had for the 2017 holiday season.
Black Friday Weekend:
Which Channels Performed Well, and Which Didn’t:
Black Friday Weekend was a huge event, as with every year. November alone
experienced the highest visits, orders, and conversions of 2017. While customers were
looking for deals, they were readier to buy and more susceptible to promotions than at
any other time during the year.
Let’s dive deeper into this month and take a look at the highest point of the year:
Visits and Conversion Metrics during Black Friday Weekend
The data around Black Friday Weekend was impressive to say the least. The entire four-
day event hiked the conversion rate for our merchants by 46.7% over the rest of the month
of November.
However, an interesting trend that we hadn’t considered was that it was mainly Black
Friday that drove these sales. While Cyber Monday was the long-time favorite for online
shoppers and meant to create an additional day for those who wanted to avoid long lines
at shopping malls, holiday shoppers are actively looking for the best deals on Black
Friday along with their brick-and-mortar peers.
Another surprising factor driven by Black Friday was the impact that channels had on
overall traffic. Google scooped up 30% of traffic (both paid and organic) with email
marketing bringing in 25%. Customers shopping on Black Friday were particularly
susceptible to marketing and promotions during this period, so email newsletter
campaigns were particularly effective as customers were proactive in searching for
products to purchase.
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www.divvit.Black Friday Traffic Channels
Instagram
Yandex 1.5%
1.3%
Unknown
5.1%
Facebook
5.1% Google
30.7%
Other
5.2%
Newsletter Direct
25.4% 21.0%
While Google and email marketing took the lion’s share of credit for traffic driven on Black
Friday, social media surprisingly underperformed with Facebook only driving 5.2% of all
traffic for our merchants. With the recent launch and promotion of Facebook messenger
marketing, it was shocking that Facebook played such a small part of Black Friday sales.
Traffic Channel Trends
Google Direct
Newsletter Facebook
11/5/2017 11/12/2017 11/19/2017 11/26/2017
While we can see that Facebook, while the dominant social network among the others,
was significantly lower against search and email. While all channels got a bit of a boost
on Black Friday, Facebook’s was a bit less than expected.
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www.divvit.Orders and Revenue during Black Friday Weekend
Black Friday Weekend was a hit for our ecommerce merchants, with a 198% increase in
sales on Black Friday over the previous Friday, and a 66.9% increase during Black Friday
Weekend over the previous 4-day span.
Pricespy
Adtraction 2.0%
3.2%
Facebook
2.6%
Unknown
5.4%
Google
33.0%
Newsletter
20.2%
Direct
Others 21.7%
8.8%
Google, again was the main force behind total conversions, bringing in a quarter of sales
for our merchants on Black Friday, and over a third of total conversions during Black
Friday Weekend. Email marketing pulled a close second with 20% of total sales during
Black Friday Weekend as well.
Black Friday Weekend Order Results
Channels
11/24/2017
11/25/2017
11/26/2017
11/27/2017
Orders 10 000 20 000 30 000
Google Direct Others Newsletter Unknown Facebook
Adtraction Yandex Bing Pricespy Zanox Price Runner
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www.divvit.The same trends were apparent in revenue, with Google creating over a third of all
revenue during Black Friday Weekend, compared with 27% of overall revenue in
November prior to this holiday.
Revenue
800 000
600 000
400 000
200 000
0 11/5/2017 11/12/2017 11/19/2017 11/24/2017
Google Direct Newsletter Facebook
Email newsletters nearly doubled their normal revenue generation with 19.3% of all
revenue during the four-day period over a 10.4% baseline during the month of November.
Keep in mind that over the course of 2017, excluding November, email newsletters only
accounted for 6.9% of all revenue. This significantly peaked in November, and shot up to
one of the top channels during Black Friday Weekend.
Revenue by Channel
Pricespy
Adtraction 1.5%
2.2%
Facebook
2.7%
Unknown
5.7%
Google
33.3%
Newsletter
19.3%
Direct
Others 24.1%
8.1%
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www.divvit.Average Order Value by Channel:
Which Channels Brought in the Highest Paying Customers?
While Google and Email marketing brought in the bulk of traffic and conversions, they had
among the lowest average order values of all channels during Black Friday and the
following three days.
While AOV in general was significantly higher towards the beginning of the month, during
the four-day holiday, it was significantly lower perhaps due to discounts offered across
several ecommerce stores, and that customers were shopping based on the best deals.
With that said, retargeting ads brought in the highest average order value with an average
of € 163.43.
In social media, Pinterest performed the best with an AOV of € 145.03 with Reddit
surprisingly coming in a close second at €124. Instagram and Facebook users were also
less ready to spend more with average order values of € 98.09 and € 80.14 respectively.
Google and Email marketing were of the cheapest AOVs during Black Friday Weekend, at
only €79.54 for Google and €75.54 for Email newsletters.
Black Friday Weekend Order Results
Newsletter
Google
Facebook
Unknown
Bing
Direct
Yahoo
Instagram
Zanox
Criteo
Reddit
External
Pinterest
Rtbhouse
Transaction
0.00 50.00 100.00 150.00 200.00
Average Order Value
This ultimately shows that while Google and email marketing drove most of the traffic and
conversions, these customers were the ones who were shopping with price in mind. Those
coming from other channels, especially retargeted ads, had already been interested in
products and were willing to spend more on Black Friday weekend.
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www.divvit.It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas:
November truly was the highpoint in 2017, as December began to lose steam around the
18th and steadily decline until the end of the month.
Visits over December 2017
1 Dec 5 Dec 9 Dec 13 Dec 17 Dec 21 Dec 25 Dec 29 Dec 31 Dec
Traffic during December 2017 was steady until the beginning of the third week and then
fell into sharp decline until after the holidays. This makes perfect sense as the 18th of
December was likely the last threshold for most merchants to receive packages before
Christmas.
There’s a significant peak just after Christmas, with visits reaching nearly the same height
as the top peaks of the month. This is likely due to post-Christmas sales and consumers
shopping for last-minute products for New Years. However, the 27th marks a sharp decline
until the end of the year.
Visits by Channel December 2017
Adtraction
1% Others
11%
Yandex
2%
Instagram
2%
Google
Unknown 33%
4%
Facebook
5%
Direct
Newsletter 23%
19%
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www.divvit.Visits by channel produced some interesting results for December 2017. Google was still
the top channel during this month with 33% of visits while Newsletters experienced a slight
decline over November, sliding to 19% (from a quarter during the previous month).
Orders over December 2017
1 Dec 5 Dec 9 Dec 13 Dec 17 Dec 21 Dec 25 Dec 29 Dec 31 Dec
Orders over December 2017 mirrors visits, however just after Christmas, though there were
significant visits, orders weren’t quite at the height of these visits. This could be that
though merchants were heavily advertising post-holiday sales, those sales weren’t quite
enticing enough to convince consumers to spend after the financial hits from the holidays.
Orders in December mirrored visits with only slight variations between each channel:
Orders by Channel December 2017
Others
26%
Google
29%
Bing
1%
Pricespy
1%
Adtraction
2%
Facebook
3%
Unknown
5% Direct
25%
Newsletter
8%
Email marketing had a significantly smaller impact on sales during December, only
accounting for 8% of total orders (compared with the 25% impact during Black Friday).
Revenue in the last month of 2017 is fascinating as there were some fluctuations between
who brought in the most visits versus who brought in the most revenue.
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www.divvit.Revenue by Channel December 2017
Others
22%
Google
32%
Pricespy
1%
Bing
1%
Adtraction
2%
Facebook
3%
Unknown
4% Direct
24%
Newsletter
11%
For example, while Google more or less maintains about 30% of traffic, orders, and
revenue, email marketing fluctuates wildly between the three. Email marketing brought in
19% of visits, being an effective driver for traffic during the month. However, email
marketing only drove 11% of total revenue during the month, and 8% of all orders.
Perhaps customers were still susceptible enough for deals to click through to the
merchants’ sites, but weren’t as ready to purchase.
We can conclude that while email marketing was extremely effective for the Black Friday
Weekend event, it lost steam during December, despite driving nearly a fifth of all traff
Average Order Value during December was considerably lower as well. The average
order value across the board was €115.82, and December’s AOV was a mere €84.36.
Across the top traffic channels, AOV plummeted in December. Google’s AOV, despite
being the top traffic, order, and revenue driver, was only €72.04 during the month. Email
marketing didn’t do much better, with an AOV of only €86.43. Facebook looked even
worse, with an AOV of €74.
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www.divvit.Average Order Value Across Channels
212.50
190.76
162.27
143.32
106.26
104.51
103.19
99.27
91.83
86.43
82.86
79.25
78.89
74.00
72.04
71.35
65.28
61.20
58.83
58.83
58.26
56.88
59.41
53.72
50.50
48.06
47.03
41.09
28.85
20.64
18.10
Tradedoubler Reddit Rtbhouse Stilleo Kelkoo Pricepi Pinterest Adroll
212.50 190.76 162.27 143.32 106.26 104.51 103.19 99.27
Zanox Newsletter Bing Criteo Yahoo Facebook Google Instagram
91.83 86.43 82.86 79.25 78.89 74.00 72.04 71.35
Adrecord PriceRunner Adviralmedia Pricespy Duckduckgo Nosto Webgains Adtraction
65.28 61.20 59.41 58.83 58.83 58.26 56.88 53.72
YouTube Yandex Tradetracker Shopello Shopalike Bounty Twitter
50.50 48.06 47.03 41.09 28.85 20.64 18.10
We’ve already established that AOV was particularly low during Black Friday Weekend as
customers were looking for deals and shopping based on price. However Google and
Facebook dropped even further during December.
Comparing December to November, there was a drop on nearly all fronts.
Though there was 17% less traffic in December 2017 than in November, orders only
dropped by 2.86%.
Traffic comparison between Nov & Dec 2017
November December
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
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www.divvit.This drop in traffic is completely justifiable, given that many consumers were finished with
holiday shopping towards the third week of the month. From there, the last two weeks of
the month were slow in terms of traffic, but given the amount of orders in the beginning of
the month, there wasn’t as much of a change between the two months.
However, revenue took a significant dive: December earned 24.5% less revenue than in
November, despite maintaining nearly the same amount of orders. This could be due to
the fact that many consumers aren’t looking to spend much after the amount of products
purchased during the holiday season.
We could also speculate that this is due to many deals that our merchants offered during
the month to boost end-of-month sales and get rid of surplus stock after the holidays. In
any case, the reason for a drop in revenue can be explained in looking at AOV for
December.
How December Measured up to November
November December
100%
90
80
70
Traffic Orders Revenue AOV
December is an, overall, strange month of the year. It performed better than other months,
with the exception of November, but this was compensated for by the sheer volume of
orders.
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www.divvit.Conclusion
The aggregated merchant data that we collected and examined over 2017 lent to a few
key surprises, especially during the 2017 holiday season.
Key Takeaways:
Reddit and Pinterest were the unexpected power houses with the highest average order
values across social networks during the 2017 holidays.
November was the biggest shopping month of the year, with the highest visits, orders,
revenue, but the lowest AOV as consumers are looking for deals.
Black Friday was still the top shopping day of the year over Cyber Monday with a peak of
visits, orders, and revenue.
December was the second biggest shopping month, but only in the number of orders as
revenue was significantly lower than November.
With this data, we can draw a few conclusions for the 2018 holiday season. Improving
certain aspects of your ecommerce store and putting more emphasis on Black Friday
offers a better opportunity for November sales.
Also, certain channels had relatively few visits, but high AOVs. These channels might be
interesting to test for 2018, as customers from these referrers are more inclined to spend.
Knowing the effectiveness of email marketing during high-volume shopping events makes
marketing easy, as we know that during these periods shoppers are more inclined to buy.
So getting your email newsletter picture-perfect is the best way to prepare your holiday
marketing campaigns.
It’s crucial to look back at the data not only to see what we’ve accomplished, but also
where we could improve. Based on the data we gathered this year, there are clear paths
to explore for a successful 2018.
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