Black Friday Toolkit 2025
Black Friday 2025 Toolkit
1. Key Shifts in Consumer Behaviour
| Trend | What’s Happening | Implication / Why It Matters |
|---|---|---|
| Earlier deal expectations | Many consumers now expect promotions to begin well ahead of Black Friday, often in October. | Brands that wait until “last minute” may be losing mindshare. Retailers are increasingly launching early-access and teaser offers to capture demand before the shopping frenzy peaks. |
| Omnichannel and mobile dominance | Mobile shopping remains huge; multi-channel communication (email, social, SMS/messaging) is non-negotiable. | The user journey may start on one channel, move to email or SMS, then convert on mobile or desktop. |
| Flexible payments & cost sensitivity | Buy-Now-Pay-Later (BNPL) tools are growing; shoppers are more budget conscious given inflation. | Offer payment flexibility; highlight value; avoid heavy discounts that erode margins unless strategically timed. |
| Chatbots, AI & messaging tools | Consumers expect faster conversations, helpful tools for discovery, order updates. | Use AI tools to reduce friction (support, discovery) not just automate volume. |
2. What Brands Should Be Doing
- 6 weeks out: The priority should be technical checks and prospecting. Consumers are in their discovery phase; we should be leveraging TOF campaigns and objectives, including Lead Generation, Reach and Traffic. On Google, you should review your product feed and audience testing to see which audiences you would like to include during the sale period.
- 4 weeks out: On Google, you should be conducting additional keyword research, understanding what non-branded search terms you would like to be targeting. Aligning on ad copy and offering. Continue to leverage TOF campaigns to help attract new audiences to the site and build your audience pools. This should also the period when you have aligned on the top-performing ad creative, ensuring you are in the best position for sale.
- 2 weeks out: Run reminder ads in the lead-up to launch, users who click “Remind Me” will receive three push notifications: 24h before, 15min before, and at the time of the event. Recommended campaign duration: 10 days, ideally using both static and video creative. A good recommendation for PMax campaigns is to launch your BFCM or Sale asset group ahead of time, allowing it to capture as much data as possible. You can use BAU or collection copy and assets but leverage your sale audience signals and search themes.
3. Practical Checklist of Deliverables
- Strategic deliverables
- Audit of past Black Friday / Cyber Week performance
- Segmentation / customer personas updated
- Value proposition / unique selling point vs competitors
- Pricing & discount strategy (bundling, limited editions, etc.)
- Creative & Content
- Key campaign theme / messaging pillars (early access, VIP, urgency)
- Creative briefs for all formats (email, social, display, video)
- Ad copywriting: hero offers, scarcity, social proof
- Graphic assets: banners, social tiles, story graphics, video snippets
- UGC / influencer content briefs or partnerships
- Channels & Media
- Email / SMS / Messaging campaigns (drip, reminders, cart recovery)
- Paid media plan: social ads, search, programmatic, affiliate
- Organic social plan: teasers, behind the scenes, countdowns, community engagement
- Partnership & influencer content
- Technical & Ops
- Website speed & mobile responsiveness check
- Checkout & payment options (BNPL etc) enabled & tested
- Stock / supply chain status, fulfillment capacity
- Shipping / returns policy defined + communicated
- Customer support ready for high volume
- Analytics & Measurement
- Tracking & tagging set up for all channels (UTM, pixels etc)
- Dashboard that shows real-time metrics (traffic, conversion, AOV, cart recovery rate etc)
- Benchmarks for success (sales targets, ROI, cost per acquisition etc)
- Post-Event Plan
- Follow-up offers for non-buyers (reminder, best-of-Black Friday)
- Thank you / loyalty messaging for buyers
- Analysis of performance to feed into next year
4. Creative Best Practices
6. Key Creative Formats to Test
Creative diversity will be key to reaching and engaging a broad audience over the sale period. We recommend incorporating a variety of asset types, including campaign, eCommerce, lo-fi, UGC, and graphic, across both static and motion formats to maximise reach and relevance.
To further enhance variety, we suggest leveraging Meta’s available ad formats such as banners, carousels, and dynamic catalogues (via carousel and collection ads) to showcase a wider product range and personalise the shopping experience.
Additionally, we recommend reviewing creative performance from previous sale periods to identify top performing formats, messaging, and styles to inform and strengthen this year’s approach.
7. Key Metrics to Track
Awareness & Demand (6 Weeks Out)
- Reach & Impressions – gauge how many people are exposed to early campaigns.
- Engagement Rate – measure interest in teasers, storytelling content, and early creative.
- Audience Growth – size of remarketing pools, subscriber lists, and loyalty sign-ups.
Consideration & Engagement (4 Weeks Out)
- Click-Through Rate (CTR) – see which creatives and offers drive traffic.
- Site Engagement – time on site, product views, add-to-cart rate.
- Cost per Engaged User – efficiency in growing mid-funnel audiences.
- CAC – monitor quality of campaigns bringing in customers.
Conversion & Performance (2 Weeks Out + Live)
- Conversion Rate (CVR) – core measure of how effectively campaigns close sales.
- Average Order Value (AOV) – track uplift from bundles, cross-sells, or promotions.
- Cart Abandonment & Recovery Rate – measure leakage vs. recapture during peak.
- ROAS / CPA / MER – keep profitability in focus as competition increases.
Post-Peak Retention
- Repeat Purchase Rate / Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) – long-term payoff from peak-season buyers.
- Opt-Out / Unsubscribe Rate – signals of messaging fatigue.
- Net Promoter Score (NPS) / Satisfaction Feedback – customer sentiment after peak.
