Introduced to the UK by Amazon back in 2010, Black Friday is now expected each year, just like Easter, Christmas and wet summers. Some of you reading this may be veteran Black Friday-ers and others might be wondering if this is the year they jump on the bandwagon. Either way, if you want to understand Black Friday (and Cyber Monday) a little bit more and find out how you can prepare for your sales, then you’ve landed on the right blog.
Why Black Friday is called Black Friday…
There are many theories as to how Black Friday got its name. But it seems no one can pin it down exactly.
Some people suggest that it comes from Friday the 24th of September 1869. This was the day that two traders duel-handily crashed the US gold market. It drained Wall Street financiers of their money and consequently, the people affected felt down and blue about the situation. Calling that fateful day Black Friday alluded to the mood of the day. But one can’t help but feel it should have been called Blue Friday.
In America, Black Friday falls on the day after Thanksgiving. Because of this many retailers believe that it was named as such because of the post-Thanksgiving sales. The discounts offered would allow them to get out of the red and into the black and finally turn a profit. And this sounds plausible, however, Britannica doesn’t believe this to be true.
The most common story is that Police Officers in Philadelphia called the day after Thanksgiving, Black Friday due to its chaotic nature. Crowds of people would descend on the city to grab a bargain. They also came to watch the Army vs Navy American Football game. This caused traffic jams and an increase in crime. This required more work and longer shifts so none of the officers wanted to be on shift that day.
Apparently, the name Black Friday stuck after that and retailers turned it to their advantage. By 1980 it was a well-established name and marketing tool for the sales day in America.
Why do people say Black Friday is bad?
From a business perspective, as long as you’re still making a profit from your sales then Black Friday can’t be bad. However, from an eco, Green and waste perspective, Black Friday has been heavily criticized. There are some retailers that have been accused of creating an intentional surplus of goods in order to increase footfall and sales. The concern is that such behaviours will add to and further encourage the throw-away culture, with thousands of products ending up in landfills. If you’re simply selling existing stock at a lower price then your conscience should be clear. For you, Black Friday is a great concept.
So, what is Cyber Monday?
Now, Cyber Monday, that’s a relatively new concept. In 2005, the National Retail Federation picked up on something. People would continue in their spending frenzy online on the Monday after Black Friday. They concluded that most people had a better internet connection at work. Meaning they could take advantage of online sales once they’d returned to their nine-to-five after the weekend.
Black Friday or Cyber Monday?
Many people question as to whether Cyber Monday is only an online thing. Although it started out that way, many savvy brick-and-mortar retailers have started making it part of a long weekend. Some even say that Black Friday and Cyber Monday and the days in between are a sale season. The weekend between the two days is often used for analysis of sales data. By identifying the popular and not-so-popular deals, Cyber Monday’s offering can be made more attractive in accordance with the results. Another benefit of having a four-day sale is that it’s an excellent way to shift stock to make way for Christmas offerings.
Black Friday is coming!
Whether you partake in the craziest shopping event of the year or not, the stats coming out of what people are now calling a cyber weekend are staggering!
Figures presented by Finder.com predict that the UK is set to spend £3 billion between Black Friday and Cyber Monday in 2023. And although this is less than previous years (due in part to the cost of living crisis and inflation) it’s still an incredible amount of pie that we’d all like a slice of! It is divided as follows:
- 51% of UK adults intend to shop over the Cyber weekend spending a predicted average spend £113 each
- 79% of Gen Z will spend more than £176
- Surprisingly, men will spend £31 more than women
- Londoners will be the biggest spenders with 68% parting with £181 each
Getting Cyber Weekend ready
If you’re a SwitchboardFREE customer then getting ready for and managing an influx of calls will be a breeze! Here’s what we suggest,
- Let your customers know what’s happening by
- Creating a relevant announcement, eg how else they can get help with their query
- Enabling queue position announcement
- Give your customer options
- Offer a choice of departments with prompts so their query is dealt with efficiently
- Let them hold by queuing incoming calls and give them upbeat hold music
- Allow for a voicemail to be left for a potential callback with callback SMS for reassurance
- Allow staff to work smarter
- Switch on call screening so agents know a sales call from a service call
- Enable missed call alerts so staff can call back customers ASAP
- Take advantage of spam blocker so your staff only answer genuine calls
- Get back up from Pocket Receptionist and protect your brand image should things become busier than expected.
Having organised your call management you’ll be able to sit back and let the Cyber Weekend happen. And if you need help setting all this up and getting ready for one of the busiest weekends of the year then give our friendly team a call on…….
What about Ruby Tuesday?
It’s a song recorded by the Rolling Stones in 1966 and released in 1967. It doesn’t have the word Black, Friday, Monday or Cyber in it, so has no link whatsoever with Black Friday or Cyber Monday. However, it did make for a great heading. Oh, and thanks for reading down to the bottom!
The post Your Ultimate Guide to Black Friday, Cyber Monday & Ruby Tuesday! appeared first on SwitchboardFREE.
