Black Friday and Cyber Week 2022 Broke Spending Records

Cyber Week met high estimates, even in the face of economic uncertainty

While the economic uncertainty made many uneasy heading into the biggest shopping season of the year, consumers were ready to break out their plastic. This year’s Black Friday sales generated a whopping $9.12 billion. As people finished off the last of the Thanksgiving leftovers and returned to work, they continued to shop the deals on Cyber Monday, which outdid its predecessor bringing in $11.3 billion. According to eMarketer, this was a 5.8% increase from last year and gives Cyber Monday 2022 the title of the biggest shopping day ever.

“On the heels of two very atypical holiday seasons, 2022 is showing signs of normalcy,” said Bruce Williams, head of performance marketing at Dentsu Media U.S. “Well, as much normalcy that a holiday season with economic clouds hanging over it can give us.” After two years of a global pandemic and subsequent supply chain issues throwing holiday numbers for a spin, the headlines about inflation, interest rates, and the state of the economy were still making retailers nervous for this key season. As the numbers reflect, many shoppers came out to take advantage of the discounts that many brands were offering. And with the supply chain issues mainly resolved, retailers were looking to clear shelf space so the discounting was in full effect.

Despite the price slashing, financing options were also a big driver of sales during this shopping period. Buy Now, Pay Later orders rose 78% from November 19th to the 25th, as compared to the prior week. As shoppers face economic changes, they could stretch their dollar further, taking the financing option for items that are already offering a discount. These options highlight, perhaps, that people are more concerned about overall spending and looking to stretch their dollars as far as possible this holiday season.

Another big winner this Cyber Week was smartphones. Almost half of all digital purchases (48%) happened on a smartphone. This is a significant figure as shoppers continue to default to the small screen in their hand over tablets and laptops. Whether prompted by a mention on social media, an email promoting a sale, or a mention of a product on the TV screen while they are watching with a device in-hand, smartphones make it easy to purchase as soon as the urge (or the ad) strikes.

Retail has continued to grow online, but many consumers are also returning to in-person shopping

Despite the economic curveballs, forecasts have been generally positive about overall growth. Ecommerce, using a smartphone or otherwise, has seen record growth over the course of the pandemic. Consumers adopted new behaviors, including ordering their groceries from the comfort of their own home, swelling the yearly spend numbers by over 40% from 2019 to 2020. And while ecommerce continues to grow, shoppers are starting to return to stores “IRL” as well.

eMarketer predicted that while retail ecommerce would account for over $235B in 2022, non-ecommerce retail would account for 4x that figure. 2021 marked the first year that brick and mortar sales grew faster (18.5%) than ecommerce (14.2%) and they expect to see this spending split reflected in this year’s numbers. While most people spent 2020 safely at home, ordering via ecommerce, they have begun returning to stores with gusto.

Cyber Week is a top earning time for CTV advertisers

We took a look at our own data from previous years to see what trends emerged and unsurprisingly, many of them lined up with the national trends. In terms of revenue generated, the top 5 shopping days all fell within Cyber Week. Last year, Black Friday was a bigger earner for MNTN advertisers as compared to Cyber Monday. Internal data from 2022 has yet to be analyzed to see if Cyber Monday took the top spot this year, reflecting the broader trends covered above.

In general, people are shopping early. This year, consumers will not only be aware of the supply issues they ran into last year and look to shop early, but they will also have access to early sale days and deeper discounts as the supply chain stabilizes this year. Consumers are looking to stretch their dollar further and starting early allows them to plot the best path to maximize their purchases.

As consumers hunt out the best available deals, advertisers should look to continue to engage them. While prospecting is an essential tool, especially as people search for the perfect gifts, our advertisers who combined their prospecting tactics with retargeting saw better results. Those that ran both campaign types saw 221% higher ROAS than those who just ran prospecting alone. The holiday season can be a crowded one; it pays to remind shoppers of what you’re offering.

Conclusion

Cyber Week has been a success, showing that shoppers are back to spending, even in uncertain times. While pre-pandemic habits have returned, like frequenting brick-and-mortar stores, new habits have also developed, with shoppers using their smartphone to shop or taking advantage of Buy Now, Save Later to stretch their dollar this holiday season.