The holiday season is upon us, and e-commerce is set to soar. According to the U.S. Holiday Shopping Forecast by Adobe, holiday sales in the U.S. are projected to hit $240.8 billion in 2024, an 8.4% increase from last year.
At Cartera, we know that shoppers are more likely to spend when they're rewarded with currency from Shop & Earn programs like the ones we build and manage for some of the world's biggest airlines and financial institutions.
Here's Cartera's approach to making the 2024 holiday season a very merry one indeed for our members, merchants, and business partners:
Plan Strategically: With only 27 days between Thanksgiving and Christmas, holiday campaigns are starting earlier. Be ready by filling your retail marketing calendar with frequent, compelling offers to keep shoppers engaged. Begin your campaigns with pre-Black Friday and early-access sales, and keep a consistent presence through late December.
Embrace Cyber Week: Forecasts say that Cyber Week will account for 16.9% of online holiday sales this year, with Cyber Monday alone reaching $13.2 billion. Black Friday and Thanksgiving Day are also set for significant growth. Daily, and even multiple, communications are key during these peak dates.
Leverage the Broad Reach of Email Marketing: Email enables merchandising reach and also serves as navigation path back to your program. That's important, since not everyone bookmarks a site and shopping portals don't always have a memorable URL. Push notifications, social, SMS, website/mobile banners, browser extensions, and other channels all play roles in a successful omnichannel strategy. But none are as strong as email.
Pulse Increased Rewards: You'll boost member spend and store conversion rates by pulsing increased reward rates. Overall, merchants that fluctuate rewards rates increase member spend and store conversions by close to 30%. The combination of bonus promotions and periodic reward increases will drive higher shop rates, average order value, and transaction frequency.
Keep These Categories Front and Center: Electronics, toys, apparel, furniture, and grocery are driving e-commerce growth; the five combined accounted for fully 65% of 2023 holiday-season sales. Keep an eye on grocery especially — it's emerging as the fastest-growing of all five categories.
Take Note of Trends: Shopping patterns change fast, and paying attention is important. Some examples:
- Follow the Retail Marketing Mindset. To capture valuable share of wallet in the competitive holiday retail environment, you need to keep your program top of mind. Your Shop & Earn program is a retail-centric experience and your marketing cadence should emulate a retail calendar. Retail calendars are all about frequency, which (again) means more offers, more often. Therefore, the holiday marketing cadence for your Shop & Earn offers should look more like a retailer and less like a traditional and less-frequent marketing plan.
- Mobile purchases are anticipated to make up 53.2% of holiday sales in 2024, totaling $128.1 billion. That's a 12.8% increase over last year.
- At the same time, the popularity of “buy online, pick up in-store” proves people still do visit stores — in 2023 those offers accounted for $16.6 billion in Q4 sales, representing a 14% increase over the previous year.
- Paid searches now drive nearly 30% of retail sales, with 37% of Gen Z shoppers reporting they're influenced by social media influencers, whose influence is anticipated to resonate 10 times more than social media overall will this season.
- The role AI plays in driving consumers to retail sites doubled in 2024. Forty percent of shoppers plan to use generative AI tools in their holiday shopping, with 70% of that group reporting that AI improves their shopping experience.
Bring More Joy To Holiday Shopping
Cartera has built successful Shop & Earn programs for major airlines and financial institutions. Ready to start, reboot, or expand your program? Let's create a customized strategy to drive your sales and engagement during holiday season 2024 and beyond.