Hyping Cyber Monday for Fun and Profit
While
some may argue that Cyber Monday is little more than a marketing
ploy created by the retail industry to separate consumers from their
hard-earned cash, there is no denying that online merchants are increasingly
focused on using the day and those that follow as a means to, well, separate
consumers from their hard-earned cash.
According to Shop.org’s eHoliday
Survey, conducted by BIGresearch, 87.1 percent of retailers are planning
to run special Cyber Monday promotions. That’s up from 83.7 percent last
year and 72.2 percent in 2007.
"Retailers
have a very acute sense of the importance of Cyber Monday in kick-starting
holiday sales and have been planning their promotions for months,"
said Scott Silverman, executive director of Shop.org, in a press release.
"It seems like companies up the ante every year for Cyber Monday, and
many holiday shoppers are eagerly anticipating the bargains that await
them this year."
A
number of retailers, as The Associated Press and
others have reported, are looking to extend Cyber Monday into longer
Cyber Weekend and Cyber Week events. Target, J.C. Penney, Toys “R” Us
and Wal-Mart are all offering special online only deals and others
incentives to sweeten the pot for shoppers.
Consumers
can also check out CyberMonday.com, a website with links to 700 companies
all offering special online deals for the holidays.
Discussion
Questions: How important is Cyber Monday in the scheme of online things
this holiday season? Will online be significantly more critical to
retail performance this year than in past holiday seasons?
This is so out of control. Cyber Monday is a creation of the NRF (via Shop.org) and the media has picked it up because that’s what the media does. Retailers have picked it up because the media has picked it up. And with the deals, the consumer will look at the prices to decide if they’re better, worse, or the same as they were on Black Friday.
And now shop.org (dot-org being the operative observation) has set up an aggregated web site with deals? I wonder if any of our readers know if this is an affiliate program or a public service site.
When so many retailers will guarantee delivery if you buy by December 20, why fixate on a day a week in advance? To answer my own question, if, in fact, sales on Black Friday weekend are high, and inventory starts to run down, Cyber Monday could turn into a “last chance” event. If they’re just average, it’ll be just another day.
I have been talking about the failure of Black Friday in my blog this week and tomorrow’s installment is all about the separation of online and the physical store when it comes to Black Friday sales. These entities are not the same and cannot be treated as such. Mimicking your store deals online is a recipe for trouble. That said, with the numbers we are expecting in retail this season, all revenue streams hold equal weight on the balance sheet.
I encourage the separation of the online store with exclusive deals and a different shopping experience. There are so many things you can do online that you can’t do at the store level. Chains like the ones mentioned do a pretty good job at differentiating the online store versus the bricks and mortar (that said, much more can be done and I don’t think we’ve scratched the surface yet when it comes to online shopping).
The war between Black Friday and Cyber Monday will probably heat up this year; who knows, perhaps Monday may exceed Friday’s sales. But Cyber Monday seems to be a symbol for the overall impact of internet sales on holiday shopping. The bigger picture is that online sales have been rising season after season, and this year should be no exception.
In this context, it’ll be interesting to see how the competition between Amazon and Walmart will play out online this holiday. At the end of the day, will it be successful online merchandising, price, service, or brand equity that determines the winner of the Christmas cyber wars?
What is called “Black Friday” was a premier shopping day long before someone gave it a name. It is a very unique day. It is the only day in the holiday season when people are off of work and have no family or weekend commitments. And it follows a day when families get together and often exchange holiday wish lists.
It got its name and shopping excitement from retailers recognizing the shopping barrage that already was underway.
The internet doesn’t need a day. The logic that it is Monday following Thanksgiving is that people go back to work and use their computers at the office to order the gifts. That is a trend which will fast disappear as more and more people get cyber connected at home (and on the road and even via smart phone). Cyber Monday is a made up wish.
That being said, online retailing will be most critical to a retailer’s success. It may be the only place where a retailer gets increased sales versus a year ago. The retailer that realizes its business is selling goods and not supporting ceilings and walls, and further realizes that the internet is considerably more efficient than the brick and mortar store, will be very successful.
Go Paula!
The whole thing is a fabrication, and smart shoppers have been buying online for weeks, and probably have wrapped their purchases already. Let’s give the customer some credit.
I agree that this is getting a little (lot) out of control. There so many contrived days of importance that this media/NRF (shop.org) one seems to have little of any value. Especially since this market is going to be extremely sales focused and they anticipate those sales to have started earlier this month (as evidenced by the Wall Street article today on Flat panel TV sales).
It is something for the media to measure, then to realize they measured it incorrectly and then re-measure, republish and analyze what the “difference” meant. Kinda’ like the GDP numbers today.