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Thanksgiving weekend has long been viewed as the traditional start of the most important sales period for retailers, and so far, the indication is that we’re in for a strong e-commerce holiday season.
Salesforce tracks activity in real time, and said yesterday Thanksgiving generated $33.6 billion in online sales globally, an increase of 6%. The US market alone rose 8% to $8.1 billion. Europe was also a standout, with 10% growth.
Adobe has it too It released its numbers for todayIt is intended for the United States only. US shoppers spent $6.1 billion yesterday, up from $5.6 billion last year. This means an increase of approximately 9%.
The two companies have different methodologies. Adobe says its analytics cover more than a trillion visits to retail sites in the United States. Salesforce said its 2024 numbers are based on shopping data from 1.5 billion consumers captured across its customers and other data feeds in Commerce Cloud, Marketing Cloud and Service Cloud. You can see more here.
But overall, this is an encouraging rebound in 2023. Some additional details:
— Last year saw a Thanksgiving slowdown when it came to online shopping. Salesforce said full-day generated $31.7 billion in online sales, while the U.S. saw $7.5 billion in sales in 2023. Both were up just 1% from the previous year. Adobe’s numbers last year showed growth of just 5.5%.
– The economy remains volatile in multiple markets, so retailers are sweetening the deal to get shoppers to part with their money. Both Adobe and Salesforce noted that discounts have been used to lure shoppers to sites and make sales, with the average discount in the U.S. reaching 27% off the listed price, both said. Salesforce added that the average selling price rose just 2% year over year on Thanksgiving, “representing one of the smallest increases we have seen since 2022.”
-Thanksgiving Day has become a major day for mobile shopping in the United States. Most physical stores are closed, and many people are with friends and family, so people are using their phones as an easier way to get items on sale. Adobe said mobile reached an all-time high, accounting for 59.5% of online sales that day.
Adobe said this led to $3.6 billion in online spending in the US via mobile, up 10.5% year over year.
Salesforce said 72% of all orders placed Thursday were on mobile devices, up 3% from 2023. Mobile accounted for 80% of all online traffic, about the same level as last year.
Cyber Week
The Internet has exploded when it comes to holiday shopping. Black Friday was a uniquely American shopping phenomenon, coming right after Thanksgiving and the start of the holiday shopping season.
Now, not only can you find “Black Friday” sales events around the world (since there is no Thanksgiving day except for syndicated showings of American TV specials), but those days and other holiday sales days are now grouped under the name “Internet Week,” which Start days before carving any turkey or pumpkin.
Salesforce marked Tuesday of this week as the start of Cyber Week, and said sales rose 7% and 14% globally and in the US, respectively.
It sometimes feels like we’ve reached a stagnant period in innovation when it comes to e-commerce, but generative AI may have something to say about that. Salesforce said the use of digital agents and GenAI by retailers was up 32% compared to last week.
Salesforce clearly sees a business opportunity in building these AI bells and whistles, so that may be why they’re teasing these specific details. “32% increase” doesn’t tell us how many AI tools they actually have, let alone how helpful they are for sales conversions, or whether they’ve led to people fleeing sites out of frustration. We’ll have to see if more tangible statistics are achieved this year.
“Holiday shopping momentum has been building throughout Cyber Week with online traffic and sales surging. After waiting all year for the best deals of the season, shoppers are finally ready to make their holiday purchases,” Kayla Schwartz, director of consumer insights at Salesforce, said in a statement. They stream their favorite sites via their mobile devices.”
We will update the Black Friday sales later today.
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