29 Nov Cyber Monday Breaks Online Sales Record
Adobe released its 2018 online shopping data for Cyber Monday and the holiday week overall. Cyber Monday is projected to hit $7.9 billion by the end of the day, making it the largest online shopping day of all time in the U.S. This represents a 19.7 percent increase year-over-year (YoY) as of 7:00 p.m. ET.
In comparison, Thanksgiving Day and Black Friday brought in $3.7 billion (28 percent growth YoY) and $6.2 billion (23.6 percent growth YoY) in online revenue, respectively. Saturday and Sunday, November 24 and 25, set a new record as the biggest online shopping weekend in the U.S. ($6.4 billion) growing faster than Black Friday and Cyber Monday with more than 25 percent on each day. The full season thus far (November 1 to 26) drove $58.5 billion in online sales, a 19.9 percent increase, with every day generating over $1 billion.
Buy Online, Pickup In-Store (BOPIS) over the weekend saw a record 50 percent increase year-over-year. As the online and offline retail experience continues to blend, retailers with physical stores drove 28 percent higher conversions online. Top sellers on Cyber Monday included the Nintendo Switch, Little Live Pets, Red Dead Redemption 2, LG TVs, drones (DJI, Air Hogs, Sky Viper), Dell laptops, FurReal Pets and Amazon Echo devices. Revenue from smartphones will hit $2.1 billion on Cyber Monday ($1.4 billion in 2017), making it the highest ever at 48.1 percent growth YoY, while smartphone traffic share grew 16 percent. Mobile overall represented 51.4 percent of site visits (43.6 percent smartphones, 7.8 percent tablets) and 34 percent of revenue (26.3 percent smartphones, 7.7 percent tablets), making it the first Cyber Monday where more than half of visits came from mobile.
“Cyber Monday sales topped $7.9 billion according to Adobe Analytics data, making it the single largest shopping day in U.S. history,” said John Copeland, head of marketing and customer insights at Adobe. “Sales coming from smartphones hit an all-time high of $2 billion and we saw a significant spike in the Buy Online, Pickup In-Store trend.”
Additional findings include:
Golden Hours of Retail: Shoppers are taking advantage of final Cyber Monday deals before heading to bed. The three hours between 10:00 p.m. and 1:00 a.m. ET on Cyber Monday are expected to drive $1.7 billion in online sales, roughly $300 million more than an average full day during the year.
Biggest Discounts: Black Friday saw the best deals for televisions (prices down 18 percent) and computers (17.8 percent). On the Sunday before Cyber Monday, shoppers saw some of the best deals for toys (31.6 percent). We expect the biggest discounts for furniture and bedding (14 percent) to happen on Giving Tuesday.
Out-of-Stock Levels: 2.4 percent of product page visits saw an out-of-stock message on Cyber Monday, up over a season average of 2.1 percent. This cost retailers up to $187 million in potential sales. In comparison, Thanksgiving saw 3.3 percent and Black Friday saw 2.8 percent, costing retailers up to $120 million and $177 million, respectively.
Top Cities by Spend: Denver had the biggest shopping baskets since Thanksgiving with orders averaging $163, followed by $157 in San Francisco, $156 in New York, $156 in Portland and $154 in the Seattle/Tacoma area. The nationwide average is $138, up 6.1 percent YoY as shoppers have gotten more comfortable buying more and bigger ticket items online.
Main Sales Drivers: On Cyber Monday, direct website traffic ranked highest for driving revenue at 25.3 percent share of sales (down 1.2 percent YoY), followed by paid search at 25.1 percent (up 7.4 percent YoY), natural search at 18.8 percent (down 2.8 percent) and email at 24.2 percent (up 0.5 percent). Similar to past years, social media continued to have minimal impact on online sales at a 1.1 percent share.
Large Versus Small Retailers: Large retailers ($1 billion or more in annual e-commerce revenue) saw 6 percent higher conversion rates on smartphones, a sign that investments in improving the mobile shopping experience are paying off. Smaller retailers, offering more specialized products, were better at getting shoppers to close sales via desktops with 7 percent higher conversions.
Methodology
Adobe leverages Adobe Sensei, Adobe’s artificial intelligence and machine learning technology, to identify retail insights from trillions of data points that flow through Adobe Analytics and Magento Commerce Cloud, part of Adobe Experience Cloud. Adobe Analytics analyzes one trillion visits to U.S. retail sites, 55 million SKUs and 80 of the largest 100 U.S. web retailers* – more than any other technology company.