BLACK FRIDAY MARKETING STRATEGY

1. Benchmark Peak Performance Differently

Most brands already expect media to get more expensive during BFCM, but what is easier to underestimate is how quickly those pressures compound.

Across our 2025 BFCM benchmark data, CPM rose 45% against the November baseline, while CPC increased 22%. Sessions increased 35%, while combined spend rose 61%.

Higher cost did not automatically mean worse performance. CPA improved 14% during BFCM week.

That’s an important distinction. BFCM is expensive, but expensive does not necessarily mean inefficient when customer intent is strong enough to justify the higher cost of reaching them.

That’s why applying a simple uplift to normal acquisition costs is too blunt for peak planning. Auction pressure, click costs and conversion demand are all changing at the same time.

The better question is not whether media will cost more. It almost certainly will. The question is whether that additional demand is still paying back at the higher price.

For e-commerce brands, that means having clear profitability and acquisition thresholds before peak begins, rather than trying to work them out while performance is moving in real time.

2. Shift More Revenue to Owned Channels

If paid acquisition becomes more expensive every BFCM, owned channels should become more important every BFCM.

Existing-customer revenue grew 13.6% year on year, compared with 9% growth from new customers. Email revenue increased 15% and SMS increased 25%, with SMS crossing $1B in sales on Black Friday alone.

Customers reached through both email and SMS also placed 11% more orders, added 34% more items to cart and viewed 71% more products than customers reached through a single channel.

CRM should therefore be part of the core BFCM revenue strategy, not something that sits behind paid media. Email and SMS can generate demand before peak auction costs arrive and give brands an earlier read on which products, messages and offers are working.

3. Sequence Your CRM Audience: VIPs First

Audience sequencing matters just as much as channel mix. Our BFCM playbook prioritises VIP and high-LTV customers first, followed by broader subscriber and early-access audiences before public launch.

This gives loyal customers a clear benefit while also generating revenue earlier in the promotional period. It can also show which products and offers are resonating before the campaign reaches a wider audience.

The role of CRM during BFCM is not simply to increase send volume. It is to generate more revenue from audiences the brand already owns and reduce reliance on paid acquisition during the most expensive part of the year.

4. Build Flexibility Into the Paid Media Budget

BFCM performance does not move evenly across channels. Meta and Google accounted for just over 90% of paid spend, but efficiency moved differently elsewhere.

TikTok represented only 3.66% of spend, while average ROAS improved 28.42% year on year and CPM fell 27.5%.

The takeaway is not that every brand should move more budget into emerging channels such as TikTok. It is that fixed allocations can become restrictive once performance starts to diverge from the original plan.

Our benchmark data can tell us where performance started, but it cannot tell us exactly where this year’s efficiency will appear. Peak plans therefore need enough structure to keep investment disciplined, but enough flexibility to move when a channel is taking more spend without performance deteriorating.

That does not mean reacting to every short-term fluctuation. It means being able to recognise sustained performance quickly enough to act on it. During BFCM, the strongest opportunities can be short-lived, and when demand is high while a channel is still holding efficiency, the window to scale into it may not stay open for long.

5. Simplify Your Black Friday Offer Mechanics

As auction pressure rises, creative has to work harder for attention, which makes clarity more valuable.

The strongest offer mechanics are usually simple: one clear discount, one clear message, a defined time limit and a direct path to purchase.

Tiered or conditional promotions can work, but complexity adds friction. If customers need to calculate the value of the offer or work out whether they qualify, conversion becomes harder.

Whatever the promotion is, the value should be clear immediately.

6. Keep Creative Bold and Legible

BFCM creative should follow the same principle as the offer. We consistently see simple, offer-led creative cut through during peak: bold text, plain backgrounds and the promotion front and centre.

That does not mean every asset needs to look the same. It means the commercial message should be immediately legible, with the offer, product and next action clear at a glance. Personalisation can then make that message more relevant without making it more complicated, using tools such as dynamic catalogue overlays, audience-specific messaging and creator-led partnership ads to adapt the execution while keeping the core proposition consistent.

The goal during peak is not to produce more creative for the sake of volume. It is to identify what is working, keep enough variation in market to maintain attention, and make sure the offer never gets lost in the execution.