All About Black Friday, Cyber Monday and Holiday Marketing

Ever Wanted To Know All About Black Friday, Cyber Monday and Holiday Marketing? Here it is!

We celebrate a variety of holidays during the calendar year. These holidays are of various types. These types include political, religious and commercial holidays. Examples of popular holidays are Independence Day, Christmas, Easter, Black Friday and Cyber Monday. The latter are commercial holidays.

What is Black Friday?

Black Friday is the day right after Thanksgiving Day in the United States. From the year 1932, Black Friday has marked the beginning of Christmas shopping. On Black Friday, major retail stores open up earlier than usual and give attractive discounts on their products. In the state of California, Black Friday is observed as an official holiday. In this state, government employees can enjoy a day off work.

The history of Black Friday

The history of Black Friday is interesting and dramatic. In the later years of the 19th Century and early years of the 20th Century, Thanksgiving parades were organized and held by department stores. Examples of such stores are Eaton’s in Canada and Macy’s in the US. These stores would utilize these parades to advertise new products or deals. Over time, other stores became interested in doing the same. Thus, the rule of thumb among department stores became that Christmas shopping would begin after the Thanksgiving parades were over. Thus, Black Friday was born. This year, Black Friday will occur on November 25th.

Another legend around Black Friday was inspired by the collapse of the American gold market on September 24th, 1869. This collapse was caused by the unethical actions of two wily financiers named Jay Gould and Jim Fisk. They intended to buy up all the publicly owned gold through the Wall Street stock market. This action would cause the price of gold to rise astronomically. After that, they would sell all their holdings for a huge profit. In this way, they were attempting to corner the US gold market.

The president of the USA, Ulysses S. Grant had other ideas for the American economy. He intended to spur economic growth by using government gold to buy up paper currency in the hands of the public and pay the citizens in gold-backed currency instead of solid gold. In this way, he would control the value of the gold-backed paper currency to keep the economy afloat. Jay Gould and Jim Fisk knew that if the president did this, they would not make much profit because the price of gold would never rise high enough.

They began to buy public gold on September 20th and also spread propaganda that the president’s economic plan was not good for America. On September 24th, the president learned about their plan to corner him and destroy his plan. In fury, he ordered the sale of $4,000,000 worth of government gold to drop its price on Wall Street. His strategy was to drop this price so much that Jay Gould and Jim Fisk would be financially ruined. Jay was very lucky to get the information early and he sold off everything before the president’s plan took effect. Thus, he made a massive profit. Jim and the rest of the gold investors on Wall street were utterly ruined. Thus, the day was named Black Friday.

What is Cyber Monday?

This is the Monday right after Thanksgiving holiday in the US. The term Cyber Monday was created so as to market the activity of shopping on the Internet. Ellen Davis is credited with this term and she mentioned it when issuing a press release citing the Monday after Thanksgiving to be a major online shopping bonanza. She is the senior VP of the National Retail Federation in the US and had got her information from BizRate Research, which was conducted by Shop.org.

In their research, the website had observed that online retailers had found a 77% spike in e-shopping on the Monday after Thanksgiving. Thus, by giving this day a name, Ellen Davis increased awareness of e-shopping among the members of the public. The first Cyber Monday occurred on November 28, 2005 and the tradition has continued ever since. Today, Cyber Monday is one of the biggest online shopping days of the year. This year, Cyber Monday will occur on November 28th.

To boost the number of sales on these commercial holidays, retailers invest time and money in holiday marketing. This refers to the marketing efforts, which are conducted right before or during holiday seasons. Here are some strategies that online retailers use when performing holiday marketing. Also to know more visit USA SEO services Company.

1. Personalizing the marketing campaigns
2. Getting staff involved
3. Targeting the consumers’ emotions

They personalize the marketing campaign

Personalizing a marketing campaign means that you should come up with a way to involve the target consumers in the campaign. This means finding a way to get them in the mix of your online marketing activities. This strategy demands that the online retailers find a fun and innovative way to make the consumers part of the marketing advertisements. One way of doing this is inviting the consumers to engage in the marketing effort through social media participation.

Involving the staff

To boost the overall effectiveness of a marketing campaign, an organization should involve its staff. According to studies, there is a 2% to 8% overlap between the social networks of employees and the company. Due to this statistic, an organization must involve its employees in the marketing campaign effort too. Examples of doing this is having them in the commercials and even encouraging them to share the advertisements of the marketing campaign in their social media pages and groups.

Target the emotions of the consumers

We may think that we make rational decisions but according to scientific study, we make emotional decisions first and then justify them using rational thought. Thus, online retailers target the emotions of their consumers in the marketing advertisements. They borrow from the overall mood of the holiday and include it in their advertisements. Records indicate that this strategy is hugely successful.

Conclusion

Black Friday and Cyber Monday are some of the most recognizable commercial holidays today. Online and offline retailers capitalize on these days to perform holiday marketing in an effort to maximize sales. Descriptions of these holidays and the strategies employed by the retail companies are indicated above. This year, enjoy Black Friday and Cyber Monday.