Over the last decade Black Friday and Cyber Monday have become two of the biggest (if not THE biggest) retail days of the year. In fact, in 2022 the UK is already planning to spend £3.95 billion across the sale weekend.
But just because customers are looking to spend, when Black Friday rolls around, you can’t stick to your standard marketing strategies. Everyone around you is promoting their extra special deals, on every channel they have. From paying out for special Black Friday Google Ads to the thunderous culmination of long-term social media and organic strategies, customers are going to be overwhelmed with advertising in every direction and from every industry.
For furniture retailers, this means you can’t just rely on your fantastic Black Friday deals to catch customers' attention. It won't be enough to simply refresh your marketing messages. You need to look at whom you're marketing to. You need a razor-sharp story that will resonate with the right audience.
One sure-fire way furniture companies can stand out on Black Friday is to harness the power of homemover data. In this post, we’ll explain exactly why customer intelligence is so important, as well as discuss actionable ways to use it.
This year Black Friday will be on the 25th of November, while Cyber Monday will be on the 28th.
Black Friday Sales originated in America so the day itself traditionally falls on the Friday after Thanksgiving - a date that is impossible to forget Stateside but can feel more like a random Friday in the UK. An easy way to remember is that it usually falls on the last Friday of November, with Cyber Monday rolling up on the other side of the weekend.
These dates are important in any industry that revolves around retail. Across the entire retail industry, companies slash their prices. And a vast number of shoppers go hunting for deals, hoping to snap up some of the biggest discounts of the year.
Many shoppers wait until this sale season to purchase big ticket items at a lower price. Particularly when it comes to furniture and big electrical items, people avoid making expensive purchases in the weeks, even months, leading up to the Black Friday sales. Instead, they save their money to splurge over the sales, knowing they will get more for their money with the deals and promotions.
When it comes to the furniture industry, the end of Cyber Monday sales see the start of a short revenue lull too. During the run-up to Christmas, shoppers have holiday shopping on their minds. While the purchase rates for gifts, food and decorations soar, everything else goes on hold until Boxing Day when shoppers return to a more typical shopping pattern.
Black Friday/Cyber Monday has even started to overtake the Boxing Day sale period, so if you miss out on the great opportunity these days offer, you are unlikely to catch those sales up for months.
These key seasonal retail sales are not without their pitfalls though. So many retailers will be offering discounts that it can be hard to catch shoppers' attention - the market will be flooded with sale offerings and standing out can be challenging.
Of course, some retailers choose to start their Black Friday sales early too, which further complicates things.
Getting ahead of your competitors isn't always about making yourself the most visible - which is good because that is expensive to attempt and often completely unrealistic. Making yourself visible to the right people is a lot easier. Plus, being visible to people who already want to buy your products creates a much bigger ROI than marketing strategies aimed at a broad audience. This means targeting.
Targeting your marketing lets you tailor your deals, tone, and the benefits you highlight so they all speak directly to a group likely to invest in your product already.
Our research shows that during the moving process, consumers dramatically increase their spending – we have discovered that homemovers in the UK spend an astronomical £29 billion in the year before and the year after a move, outside of the transaction value. This is an audience that is looking to spend and spend a lot.
But during the Black Friday holiday season, they are going to need a lot more incentive to spend their money with you.
The most effective way of targeting your consumers on Black Friday is to base your marketing strategy on data. Homemover data can give you the insights you need to make sure your customers choose you over your competitors.
This makes the timing of your marketing vital. Targeting customers specifically in the ‘Moving Soon’, ‘Moving Now’ and ‘Just Moved’ stages of the home mover wave lets you speak to shoppers who are already looking to buy big-ticket furniture items NOW. While they'll be looking for a good price, you don't have to rely on unbearably low deals to win a sale. Instead, you will get a higher ROI on your marketing spend while also maintaining a more realistic pricing strategy.
Black Friday also gives you an opportunity to target people in the ‘Settling In’ stage. People who deferred their big buys like a three-piece suite or matching bedroom storage during the moving process will be looking to tailor their new home to their tastes and comfort and significant sale savings could persuade them to make more extravagant purchases.
Offering a range of delayed and super quick delivery options means that people in the 'Moving Soon' and 'Settling In' stages are equally likely to commit. After all, someone who is moving soon won't want their new furniture today if it just means more items to pack into the removal van. Similarly, a customer who is already in their new home is going to be even more impatient to get their home sorted.
Alternatively, target promotions on essentials to those 'moving soon' and keep back those 'final touch' items for those already 'settling in'.
Homemover data is an important way to improve your ROI during the Black Friday sales. However, furniture retailers also need to remember the basics to truly maximise returns. These include:
TwentyCi can supply you with homemover data that is completely factual. We don't use modelled or sentiment-based data so you can rely on our information to give real-world insights that you can build on.
The scale and scope of our data is unmatched in the UK too. We have access to data from over 4,500 providers, that you can use to help streamline your marketing and maximise your ROI across Black Friday and all year round.