While the in-person and online shopping experience have their differences, what they both continue to share are the sales that attract tons of customers. Black Friday is a popular example, but another that’s quickly rising is Amazon Prime Day. This sale is a two day annual event held in July and October where Amazon Prime members get access to a ton of different deals. The combination of lower prices and convenience are making these online shopping sales much more attractive to buyers, and not just for big name brands. If you look closely and find out why these deals get so much attention, you can apply them to your small business, and bring a lot more traction to your store!
Before anything else, the first aspect of this that should be considered is how deals like Amazon Prime Day impact more staple traditions, like the Cyber 5 (the timeframe of shopping and deals that take place between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday). According to a ThinkWithGoogle study, searches for “Black Friday deals” grew by over 200% as early in the year as July. We’ve found that this correlates with shoppers’ rising interests in getting their shopping done as early as possible, for less crowded schedules and to get everything they need before it’s sold out.
We can see here that customers who shop on Cyber 5 days are also taking advantage of Amazon Prime Day all the way in July, taking advantage of the deals then to avoid the hassle of Black Friday and other holiday shopping. Similarly, other big retail businesses have been doing this as well, such as Target or Wal-mart.
While small businesses can attempt to do the same, it’s important to fully understand their audience before they devote a ton of time and effort to putting on a sale. With all of these large competitors also advertising their deals, a small business will have to run something that’ll really capture their audience’s attention, and get them over to their side.
We recommend that, at the very least, you give it a shot for a year and see if it has any sort of impact. If it does, try and find what went right to see if you can replicate it, or if it didn’t, you now know where your attention could be better focused. If you do choose to run a deal during this time, make sure to give it a fair amount of coverage on your socials, with at least 8 posts spread throughout its duration.
Even with all of this, don’t stress! According to ThinkWithGoogle, 40% of customers prefer if the websites they shop from have a wishlist function, so they wait for the right time or deal to purchase the products they want. So, if you have the option to add a wishlist to your website, we recommend you do it! Plus, Google’s new search engine tool that watches for when the cost of a particular item will be at its lowest will likely begin to make an impact on this as well.
Overall, this goes to show why paying careful attention to trends in the market can help your business be a step ahead and predict what your customers are going to want! Watching the way big name brands act and how their effects trickle down can be a very handy addition to your toolbelt so you can make better informed and data-driven decisions. If you want some more help on this subject, sign up for a consultation with us, and if you missed Google’s latest update, along with all the others coming to Google, check out our YouTube video on the subject!
4 Tips Amazon Prime Day
- Try running a sale during Amazon Prime days in July. If it works, great! If it doesn’t, don’t do it again.
- If you can add a wishlist to your site, then do it! It typically leads to bigger purchase since people save up for them.
- Bundle products for people so that they can purchase more than one thing to offset shipping costs. People are more likely to make a purchase when they can buy more than one product.
- Keep track of what your customers are searching for on Google to know what the current current trends are.
