eBay said Cyber Monday sales were “brisk”, and noted that on Thanksgiving Day, mobile “gross merchandise bought” increased 25% year-over-year. The ADI reported that the average online shopper spent $133 this year. Crowds seemed smaller on Black Friday this year and sales fell to $10.4 billion, down from $11.6 billion in 2014, according to preliminary figures from ShopperTrak.
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The following summary includes highlights from aggregate data on global online shopping purchases with more than 130 USA retailers during November 19-30, 2015.
Target had a big weekend, setting an e-commerce traffic record on Black Friday and doubling that Cyber Monday, thanks in large part to assertively promotional pricing. Similarly, Black Friday enjoyed a 14 percent growth in online sales by raking in $2.7 billion. This jump in online shopping came from the week of online deals in promotion of yesterday’s Cyber Monday, which was forecasted to be the biggest online shopping day of the year.
Total digital spend on Cyber Monday reached $3.118 billion, a 21-percent annual gain – the first time in history that total digital spend surpassed the $3 billion milestone in a single day. Target showed the deepest discounts on average price across items, with 6.8% or less from the day before Thanksgiving through the day after Black Friday. Amazon was one of the strongest performers.Experian-IMRG predicted £943 million will be spent online during Cyber Monday, 31% higher than the £720 million spent previous year.
Over $514 million in sales were attributed to mobile, including $313 million from smartphones ($205 million iPhones, $107 million Android) and $201 million from tablets ($170 million iPad, $28 million Android).
Amazon itself said sales of its electronic gadgets more than tripled over the entire Thanksgiving weekend, with the Fire tablet its top-selling product. Retailers did not significantly discount the vast majority of popular products.
Cyber Monday did not go without a hitch, however.
Even with the growth in online shopping, there’s room to expand sales further: Shopping cart abandonment still costs retailers 36 percent of sales, according to PYMNTS.com.
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That sounds like a price war that could send margins hurtling downward, considering how much time is left in the holiday shopping season.
