When times are tough, the strength of the relationships you form with your customers becomes absolutely critical. The foundations for maximizing revenues lie in building trust and loyalty. That depends partially on getting your communication right and creating the right experiences, which is especially important during the peak holiday shopping season. But before you can do that, you really have to zero in on who your customers are and what they want.
Know your customers
The figures suggest that, if you want to up your average spend over the peak holiday shopping season, you should be targeting younger shoppers. Customers ages 25-34 years old had the highest average spend over the Black Friday period last year, according to Wunderman Thompson Commerce’s independent research. This group spent an average of $161—well above the average of $96.34 across age groups, and almost four times the $43.84 spent on average by consumers aged 55+.
Younger shoppers are more open to the idea of upping their spend over the peak holiday shopping season, too—just 12.6% said nothing would convince them to spend more, compared with 51.7% of consumers aged 55+. And for any retailers who feel competing with Amazon over the peak shopping period is becoming an insurmountable challenge—16-24 year olds spent the lowest proportion of their money through Amazon of any age group last year (29.9% of overall spend), while nearly three quarters (72%) told our Future Shopper survey that Amazon wasn’t the right place to find the brands they want.
Of course, retailers cannot simply switch all of their attention to younger shoppers only. There is an equally valid argument that says finding ways to encourage more reluctant shoppers to up their spend is an even better strategy for boosting revenue because it unlocks untapped potential. It’s also worth noting (and a great opportunity) that an eye-watering 61% of UK consumers didn't purchase anything during last year’s Black Friday period.
Across age groups and demographics, retailers need to understand what will motivate consumers to spend more. When we asked shoppers this question after last year’s peak season, the top answers included bigger discounts (44%), discounted/free delivery (23%), easy/free returns, and faster delivery (both 18%).