The 15-Point Store Checklist For 2024 Black Friday / Cyber Monday

Every ecommerce merchant knows Black Friday / Cyber Monday (BFCM) are the most profitable holiday shopping days.

According to the Adobe Report, Black Friday online spending continues to rise year after year and reached a record high in 2023.

For ecommerce brands, the increased spending is great news.

To be able to fully utilize BFCM, retailers should prepare their sites by optimizing page speed, improving product descriptions, setting up referral campaigns, etc. In this article, we'll cover all of those and much more.

The 15-Point BFCM Checklist: How To Prepare Your Store For Black Friday / Cyber Monday

Below is the 15-point checklist to ensure your store is ready for BFCM. 👇

1. Start early - Customers start looking for deals in October

Start planning for Black Friday now if you haven't started.

A 2023 Statista survey found that 50% of US consumers begin their holiday shopping as early as October. 

This is the time to start testing different offers and coupons. For the best results, A/B test different versions with third-party tools.

2. Learn from other successful Black Friday campaigns

You can use websites like Milled or Really Good Emails to learn from other brands running Black Friday marketing campaigns.

You just need to type in keywords like “Black Friday” to get a bunch of good marketing campaign examples:

3. Prepare your referral/affiliate campaigns

Referral and affiliate programs can be a great way to get existing customers to share word about your BFCM offerings.

For example, you could offer 30% off to both the advocate and friend for every successful referral to your Black Friday campaign.

You can set up your referral/affiliate program using ReferralCandy and notify new and existing customers about it via email. ReferralCandy also has a 14-day free trial available.

ReferralCandy is also available in the Shopify App Store.

If you need help with the referral/affiliate program setup process, here are some articles that can help:

• How to Build a Referral Program in 2024 (With 80+ Examples)
• 11 Best Referral Program Ideas (To Attract New Referrals)
• 25+ Referral Landing Page Examples (And Why They Work)

4. Check your site speed: A slow site means no sales

A lack of site speed directly hurts your profit margins. In fact, ecommerce sites that load within a second convert 2.5x more visitors than those that load in five seconds.

You want to make sure that doesn't happen on your website.

There are a number of free tools you can use to test your website speed. One of them is Google’s PageSpeed Insights.

If you find your site speed is too slow, simple things you can do are:

• Compress images with image optimization tools
• Remove unused apps/plugins from your website
• Reduce the amount of page redirects on your website
• Use third-party apps for page speed

Improved page speed can have a direct positive effect on your BFCM sales.

5. Improve your checkout process

The Baymard Institute identified the main reasons consumers abandon shopping carts, and they are:

• The extra costs (shipping, tax, fees) are too high
• Sign-up is necessary in order to buy
• Consumers aren’t trusting the site
• The delivery process is too slow
• The checkout is too complicated

Most of these are factors you can control.

To improve your checkout, you can do the following:

• A/B test different price variations
• Remove sign up process (if you have one)
• Improve your site’s overall trustworthiness
• Reduce unnecessary steps from your checkout
• Showcase return/refund policies
• Turn on a test mode and try that the checkout actually works
• Accept multiple payment methods

Especially during Black Friday and Cyber Monday, shoppers are fickle. They have thousands of stores to select from and a limited amount of time. They will leave your store if your checkout process is inefficient.

Taking a day to improve your checkout process could pay off for you on Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

6. Take site backups

You'll also want backups for everything from site code to product images. Black Friday only comes once a year.

If you use Shopify, you can install one of the available backup apps (there are some great free options available).

Shopify backup apps

Even if you use an ecommerce provider other than Shopify, free backup apps are available.

7. Make sure your product descriptions sell

When creating your BFCM campaigns, write product descriptions that sell.

One well-known principle of influence is scarcity, which you can emphasize with limited-quantity items and limited-time offers.

Here are the two scarcity principles in more detail:

• Limited number: A product has a limited supply and won't be available once it runs out‍
• Deadline (Limited time): The item is only available during a specific time period

For more information about the above, check out our article on examples of scarcity principles in marketing.

8. Improve your site SEO

It's also important to do some search engine optimization (SEO) so shoppers can find what they are looking for. 

Here are additional resources to help you:

• SEO For Black Friday/Cyber Monday: Boost Sales And Traffic
• Ecommerce SEO Best Practices in 2024 (You Can Do Today)
• Strategies to Drive Traffic to Your Shopify Store
• An Ultimate Guide to Shopify SEO (with Templates!)

9. Review last year’s performance

If you had promotions last year, you will want to review your sales data to see what went well. This information can give you ideas on making alterations to existing products.

Plan ahead and create a product schedule that will determine the products that go on sale and the price. Get ahead of the game and make slight tweaks rather than making it up at the last minute.

10. Apply the right discounts

The average Black Friday sale in 2023 was 31% as reported by Demandsage.

Most retailers are offering at least 20% off on Black Friday. Many sites are even offering 50% off for first-time buyers or more specific deals like 30% off for 5 or more items.

Get creative with the discounts that you offer!

Here are some tips for your Black Friday discounts:

• Display discounts clearly: Whether on the home page, product description, or checkout, make discounts visible so customers know how much they will save. Take advantage of announcement bars, pop-up notifications, banner ads, etc.
• Add a countdown banner: A countdown banner adds urgency and builds excitement. You can create countdown banners with tools like Powr in a matter of minutes.

11. Take advantage of cross-selling

Black Friday and Cyber Monday are a great time to level up your cross-selling game.

If you have a customer who is making a purchase, you should refer them to something that will naturally fit together. 

Think of simple cross-selling examples, like:

• Socks + shoes
• Paper + pencils
• Yoga mats + yoga straps

Ask yourself: If someone is making a purchase, is there anything else they may need?

To create cross-sell offers, you can use third-party tools. For example, in Shopify App Store, you can find a variety of tools for this.

Even if you use other ecommerce platforms like WooCommerce or BigCommerce, you’ll find tools for this.

When creating cross-sell offers, you may want to create distinct Black Friday and Cyber Monday pages with related products for customers. This can consolidate your efforts.

If you currently have a SALE section on your website, it is easy to alter the text to make it a special Black Friday and Cyber Monday navigation bar.

Extra sales tip: During your BFCM promotions, you can also set up upsells. One way to showcase them is to include them in your thank you page after a customer makes a purchase. For example, you might offer the same product at a slightly higher discount.

12. Email marketing campaigns

According to Campaign Monitor, 116.5 million emails were sent on Black Friday, which is more than any other day of the year. These Black Friday emails also saw the highest numbers of opens and links clicked compared to other days of the year.

Black Friday emails give you an opportunity to connect with your loyal customers and provide them with a special discount.

Start your email marketing campaign at least a week prior to Black Friday to whet your customers' appetite. You want to pique their interest in the sales you'll be offering. Richard Lazarra, an ecommerce expert said:

• “Because emails are so critical and deliver huge ROI, prepare your emails well in advance. Have the copy ready, the images ready, and the email prepped to go. Give yourself plenty of time and lots of opportunities to review everything prior to the big day.”

You may want to start a month in advance and send weekly emails for four weeks until Black Friday. 

Send out an email the night before Black Friday and Cyber Monday. 

Finally, send out an email about the discounts on the big day. This will ensure that your list is well aware of the discounts that you're offering.

But don't stop there. Follow up after Black Friday and Cyber Monday to request feedback and invite them to revisit your store. 

You may want to add an automated abandoned cart recovery email to prevent customers from slipping away. With abandoned cart emails, they'll receive a follow-up email if they get to the checkout and fail to make a purchase. Shopify includes this feature as standard.

13. Write interesting email headlines

Bland headlines won’t cut your Black Friday campaigns.

A traditional discount-only approach will likely be deleted before being opened.

You'll want to be as personalized as possible. People are more likely to open something that they can tell is pertinent to them. You can include their name in the headline and a detail about the email. 

Be as descriptive as you can in your headline to catch the reader's attention. Too many emails get ignored because they are copies of the industry.

14. Pitch gift guides for Black Friday preparation

Gift guides for the holidays are a great way to increase sales. It helps you to get ahead of the curve and position your products early. Holiday gift guides are very popular with bloggers. Connecting with influential bloggers and sponsoring one of their gift guide posts is a great place to start. You could also create a gift guide for your own store.

15. Set up your analytics system

There are a bunch of tracking and analytics tools you can use to track the performance of your BFCM campaigns.

• Heat Maps: Tools like Hotjar or Crazy Egg help you understand user behavior by showing where users click, scroll, and spend time on your website.
• Google Analytics: Gives you insights into website traffic, user behavior, and conversion rates.
• Conversion Tracking: Set up conversion tracking in Google Analytics or through tools like Facebook Pixel to measure the effectiveness of your campaigns.
• A/B testing tools: A/B testing tools allow you to test different versions of your landing pages, emails, or ads to see which performs better.
• Email marketing analytics: Email marketing tools offer detailed info on open rates, click-through rates, and conversion rates.
• Ecommerce analytics tools: Platforms like Shopify, WooCommerce, or Magento often have built-in analytics dashboards that provide insights into sales, average order value, and customer behavior. These can be invaluable for tracking the success of your BFCM promotions.

Word-of-mouth marketing for your BFCM campaigns

Marketing will be extremely competitive this Black Friday / Cyber Monday season.

One of the ways to stand out from the crowd is through word-of-mouth marketing. 

With ReferralCandy, you can set up a referral program in minutes, rewarding customers for new referrals and incentivizing new purchases with special offers. 

Open up a new channel for growth and make the most of the holiday season with ReferralCandy.