Black Friday 2020 to Boost Up Your Software Products Sales

Why is Black Friday important?

The famous Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, is often the busiest shopping day of the year as it usually symbolizes the start of the holiday season. This time is essential for many retailers since the holiday season amounts to almost 20% or more of their annual sales according to the National Retail Federation (NRF).

NRF also reports that a total of 189.6 million people shopped over the four-day Black Friday weekend in 2019, a 14% increase over the previous year. The same goes for online sales, in the case of software development products the number of subscriptions and purchases has increased by more than 20%.

In 2020 The Black Friday will happen on the 27th of November, even though quite differently.

How does it work?

Some retailers start their Black Friday sales on Thanksgiving Day and deals typically run throughout the whole weekend and even continue the next week. Black Friday has become an international event, which lots of people from all around the world look forward to. Many delay big purchases sometimes waiting for months to get the best deal of the year.

The end of November is a strategic time since lots of people start their holidays and preparation for Christmas. Furthermore, buying valuable presents on Black Friday is way more affordable.

Cyber Monday

Often the best Black Friday deals are, surprisingly, not on Black Friday itself. Many retailers, for example, Amazon, offer sales earlier and earlier with each year, upstaging Black Friday. In this way, some of the customers make their purchases even before they see other companies’ offers.

It was the biggest online shopping day of the past years, and in some years it has surpassed Black Friday in terms of total sales. For example, in 2019, Cyber Monday sales totaled $2 billion more than those on Black Friday.

However, these two sales days work differently for different businesses. Before starting your Black Friday campaign, consider the differences and choose the one you will focus on. For software businesses, which operate and sell mostly online, Cyber Monday might even work better.

2020 Black Friday Updates

It's hard to imagine seeing the deluge of people scrambling for doorbuster deals happening this year with safety restrictions due to COVID-19. The ongoing pandemic has brought changes to our lifestyle as well as our behavior. In 2020 Black Friday will be unlike any previous one. It is expected to be longer and more online than ever. Nearly every major retailer will offer deals and exclusive offers throughout the month of November if they have not started already.

"Over the past six months, our customers have been shopping differently, and we expect that will continue into the most important shopping season of the year - the holidays," said Scott McCall, the executive vice president, and chief merchandising officer of Walmart U.S. Also, from his words, many plans on starting their holiday shopping well before Black Friday and that they’ re looking for gifts that fit their current lifestyle.

The same refers to software development products. More and more businesses switch to online mode and optimize all the processes, thus, creating bigger demand. Black Friday season is a big chance to boost your sales even further, yet if planned and managed wisely. Consider the following couple of strategies to stand out from your competitors this more-than-ever digital year.

Strategies to Maximize Software Sales in 2020

1. Load Test Your Website

One of the most important rules to succeed in business (and in life) is to expect the unexpected. Even if huge traffic overload which can cause web page crush seems an impossible problem to come, a critical part of a successful Black Friday marketing strategy is to get your website ready for any potential traffic surge.

To ensure this, contact your web hosting provider to discuss the traffic limitations and possible extensions. While nowadays most servers should be able to handle increased traffic sustainably without upgrading, be sure to analyze the data from previous years and prepare for the worst-case scenario.

You can start with checking your page speed using free speed tests available on the web; simply enter your site URL to check how your website stacks up. This will help you indicate the need for further changes.

2. Use Personalized Black Friday Advertising Emails

Sending personalized emails or a well-planned drip campaign might be useful in achieving your goals in the sale period, just start communicating with the potential customers in advance, establishing interest and loyalty.

Target those people who visited your store during the last year’s Black Friday and those who were interested in the prices, using the insight you collected to add relevant product recommendations that encourage customer engagement and potential purchase.

Personalized emails, compared to those general ones, show a 20% higher conversation rate. Furthermore, they are proved to encourage your visitors to come back and get the Christmas present or a New Year gift – this time even for full price - from your store.

3. Promoting items that are most popular in your store

Mass buying behavior, especially in this period, is often driven by the desire to "keep up with the Joneses" - people will compare what they purchased and the bargains they managed to find. They want to know they buy a product everyone is lusting after but do it at a better price.

Highlighting the most trending products you also introduce the concept of scarcity. Your potential customers will feel that a popular product at a good price can be sold out fast or see a price increase in the nearest future. This motivates them to move now.

4. An ideal pop-up strategy

Whether that be a discount code or a small gift, displaying a Black Friday offer in a pop-up helps maximize the response you get from the traffic you have during these days. You can also increase the effectiveness of this by adding a time limit to your offer – not only does this create a sense of urgency but adds value to the customer experience.

Since typically a big part of the visitors are first-timers when they leave there’s practically no way to get back in touch with them and that might mean wasted opportunities. Pop-up or a banner space is a great way to encourage visitors to leave their email addresses, thus, communicate with them further.

You can also consider adding these features to your software products sale:

a)Making the most of flash sales to increase engagement

b)Offering complementary items for increased membership size

c)Converting visitors before they leave

d)Making the most of PPC campaigns for increased ROAS

5. Highlight Your Strong Returns Policy

Undoubtedly, poor returns policy is one of the biggest barriers to purchase, and on these sale days (if not always) a strong and clear returns policy is a make-or-break in your holiday marketing strategy.

During Black Friday and Cyber Monday, people buy in a hurry, the sales cycles are substantially shortened, and they don’t have much time to research. But one thing most customers anyway do is they check the product’s warranty and return possibility.

Highlight your great returns policy everywhere you can. Software developers can start promoting a free trial period in advance, which already shows your company’s confidence in the products you offer.

Your task is to make them feel comfortable making a snap decision- and it is your returns/membership cancellation policy that will help you do this. If there is transparency (somewhere on the main pages or during the checkout process) explaining well the terms under which they buy a product, then they are more likely to proceed with the transaction.

Concluding words

The truth is that there’s a lot to be done to truly prepare for the holiday shopping season. During the first half of 2020, consumers have already shown a shift in the way they shop – from the type of products they choose to the volume they are purchasing while getting used to “new normal”. Digitalization boost has increased the usage of software products, creating more opportunities for smaller IT companies’ growth. Therefore, do not miss the time to maximize your performance and set new sales records.