It’s the time of year when people are using a lot of their hard-earned dollars to get things for the people they care about. In other words, it’s the best time of year for ecommerce businesses. Now that it’s the Tuesday after the big weekend, let’s check in and see how things have been going.
What are your thoughts about performance from the weekend? Let us know in the comments.
According to Custora, Thanksgiving saw a 12.5% increase in ecommerce revenue with a 10.8% increase in ecommerce orders. There was a 1.5% increase in average order value compared to last year, which the company considers an indication of a “less promotional, discount-driven” quarter.
Mobile commerce was 39.3% of all online commerce, up from about a third (34.3%) on Thanksgiving 2014, it says, adding that 78.3% of mobile commerce on Thanksgiving was done on iPhones and iPads with Android accounting for 21.5% of mobile online orders placed.
They also shared some stats for Cyber Monday, which was the biggest online commerce day in the U.S. ever, it says:
– Strong growth: E-Commerce revenue was up 16.2% over Cyber Monday 2014
– Orders grew 14.7% and Average Order Value (AOV) was up 1.3%, indicating a less promotion-driven Cyber Monday than last year
– 26.9% of online sales were placed on mobile (phones + tablets), up from 23% on Cyber Monday 2014
– Over three quarters of all mobile orders (75.6%) were made on Apple devices, while only 24.2% happened on Android devices
– Email marketing was the primary channel driving online sales, accounting for 22.1% of transactions
– Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest, etc. only drove 1.5% of sales
For the whole weekend through Monday, Custora says, “Revenue growth over 2014 came in strong at 16.4%. The strong growth overall for the weekend was driven by mobile (Apple devices in particular), email marketing, and Google search.”
This week, Google shared some of the biggest search trends for gifts:
Monetate found mobile phone commerce traffic to be up 118% (up 86% on Android, 50% on iOS) but found add-to-cart rate on mobile to be down 23%. It also found that Add-to-cart rate was up nearly 1% driven by Twitter (up 56%), desktop (up 22%) and tablet (up 17%) and that online commerce traffic from Facebook was up 92%.
For Black Friday, Monetate found that online spending was up 13% year over year.
“Consumers averaged bigger online [orders]… on Thanksgiving than on Black Friday,” a spokesperson tells WebProNews. “While Black Friday conversion rates were down 10%, average order value was up 2% YoY. Average order value was up YoY on mobile phone (12%) and Facebook (10%), but down on Twitter (33%).”
“Screen size mattered,” the spokesperson says. “Consumers used mobile phones to [look]…but spent the most on desktop and tablet. Desktop users spent the most on average ($169) followed by tablet ($163), Facebook ($138) mobile phone ($130). iOS users spent more on average ($156) than Android users ($132). The week high for average order value was $173 on Thanksgiving compared to $164 on Black Friday.”
DemandWare shared some findings as well. According to that company Black Friday orders were 6.1 times higher than a non-peak period (4 weeks ago), which is a 40% increase over last year. Black Friday baskets created on phones more than doubled year-over-year, according to DemandWare, which also says that on Thanksgiving, phone traffic share began increasing from 5pm until midnight.
The IAB released a new report finding that younger adults, ages 18 – 34, are more likely to favor smartphones for retail activities than any other age group.
While overall, consumers are more likely to order something using a tablet (35%) than a smartphone (28%), this younger generation is more inclined to do so using their smartphones (43% vs. 35% on a tablet), a spokesperson for the IAB told WebProNews. Those 35-54 are more apt to use a tablet…and are more apt to get something on those devices (41% vs. 35% general population), they said.
– 18-34 year olds are more likely to read a product review on their smartphones (44% vs. 32% general population) and less likely to do so on tablets (32%). They’re also inclined to check prices on a smartphone (42% vs. 33% general population) and are less likely to do so on a tablet (32%).
– Those who are 35-54 are more prone to use tablets to read product reviews, locate stores, check store hours, and check product pricing (40% vs. 35% general population).
– Adults ages 55-64 are more than twice as likely to get something on a tablet (34%) than on a smartphone (15%).
– Consumers 65+ are more than twice as likely to get something on a tablet (26%) than on a smartphone (11%). They are also nearly twice as likely to read a product review on a tablet (31%) than on a smartphone (17%).
For a look at the IAB’s full report, go here.
Amazon had an all-time high weekend for its devices. While the company didn’t reveal any hard numbers, it says it sold “millions of devices” and 3x over last year.
Groupon also had a good weekend.
“Groupon’s North American billings were up 41% compared to last year, and customers…[got] 52% more Groupons over the four-day weekend than in 2014,” a spokesperson for the company said. “Like other e-commerce sites and retailers…[tangible] products led the weekend.”
Groupon also saw a “tremendous appetite” for local experiences. CEO Rich Williams talks about the company’s weekend here.
What didn’t have such a great weekend were Pinterest’s “buyable pins” and their counterparts from Facebook and Twitter. A report from Re/code says that one of Pinterest’s big launch partners for Buyable Pins has been seeing less than 10 transactions a day with the feature.
Interestingly, Google just essentially turned Image Search into a Pinterest competitor, which could negatively impact Pinterest even more considering that Google search is already a primary place that people are looking for things to get.
How is your business faring compared to last year? Discuss.
