There were $9.3 billion sales across Black Friday Cyber Monday on Shopify in 2023 coming from millions shoppers - 73% of which were shopping on mobile.

And as Black Friday 2024 grows closer, more and more Shopify merchants are looking for ways to maximise their sales across the most exciting weekend of the year.

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What is Shopify Black Friday Cyber Monday?

For Shopify merchants, the Black Friday Cyber Monday weekend is the highest volume shopping event of the year.

The past two Shopify Black Friday Cyber Monday events have been record-breaking. Harley Finkelstein, President of Shopify, had this to say:

“Black Friday Cyber Monday showed that consumers are voting with their wallets to support the independent brands they love. We saw record level shopping happening across all channels this weekend, proving businesses that meet their customers where they are, whether that’s online or in-person, will earn their loyalty in return.”

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Key Shopify Black Friday Cyber Monday Stats from 2023

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More than 61 million consumers made purchases from Shopify-powered stores across the Black Friday Cyber Monday weekend.
At peak hours, the Shopify platform was handling 58 million requests per minute. That's 967,000 per second.
This BFCM, over 17,500 merchants made their first ever sales on Shopify.
55,000 Shopify merchants reported record-breaking sales across the weekend
Peak sales per minute: $4.2 million at 12:01 PM EST on Nov. 24.
Top selling countries: U.S., U.K., Australia, Canada, and Germany.
Average cart price: $108.12 ($107.53 on a constant currency basis).

Source: Shopify

When is Black Friday Cyber Monday 2024?

Black Friday 2024 is on Friday 29 November and Cyber Monday is on Monday 2nd December.

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What sells the most during Black Friday Cyber Monday on Shopify?

In 2022, the top product Shopify Black Friday Cyber Monday categories were:

Apparel & accessories
Health & beauty
Home & garden

Which is only slightly different from the top selling product categories on Shopify in general:

Apparel & accessories
Health & beauty
Sustainable and eco-friendly products

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10 Shopify Black Friday Cyber Monday Strategies

Heading into Shopify Black Friday Cyber Monday without a strategy is like building lego without instructions.

Sure, you might make something pretty cool, but it’s going to be far from what you should have done.

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1. Offer More than the Average

Data from Shopify Plus stores shows the average discount offered by Shopify merchants in 2022 was 14.3% - but customers expect more than the average.

Black Friday is the one time of the year customers look for more than just a 10/15/20% discount, especially if you already run those offers throughout the year.

In order to stand out among the crowd and drive real excitement, you need to offer something exclusive and compelling to both your brand and the weekend.

Free gifts, unusual offers, or higher discounts are a must - and let your customers know how exclusive these offers are. If they leave it late, they’ll miss out, possibly not being able to access that offer again.

As you may have seen in our 5 Top Tips for Shopify Black Friday Cyber Monday article, sales are starting earlier and earlier, which can make some brands hesitant to offer deeper discounts.

In that case, consider shaking up or increasing your offers day to day instead of making them consistent. For example, you might have 20% offer on the Thursday, then 30% on the Friday and 40% across the weekend. Alternatively, you might offer discounts on certain product categories only on specific days.

Not only does that increase excitement, but it means some customers may shop at a lower discount to prevent missing out from the products going out of stock, increasing your revenue.

Alternatively, look for opportunities to drive a higher order value. Instead of discounting single products, create bundles of products that work well together and run those at a discount. That way, customers can still benefit from an offer whilst you benefit from higher AOVs.

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2. Reward Loyal Customers

Black Friday offers the perfect opportunity to reward your most loyal Shopify customers.

Consider letting VIP customers access the sale early, gain exclusive discounts for certain products, or receive a free gift with their order.

Loyal customers already love your brand, so they’re far more likely to spend more across the weekend.

According to research by Adobe, “a brand’s top 1% of customers generally spends five times more than the other 99%.”

It’s down to you to work out how big this segment is. You may look at your most frequent shoppers, those who have the biggest basket, or customers who were with you before anyone else. Or you might look at all three, offering different incentives depending on their behaviour.

If you want to be really specific, you could even create segments based upon recent customer activity, offering direct offers to customers who have engaged with certain categories.

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3. Create Awareness Ahead of Time

Customers expect Black Friday deals, but that doesn’t mean you don’t need to market them.

With so many stores running offers, you can easily get lost in the commotion, so running inventives and interesting marketing ideas helps keep your brand top of mind.

Take a look at what other brands in your area have done over the years and see how you can improve on them. Look at brands you admire, what have they done that you can adapt?

Think about the main channels you’ll be using: social media (organic and paid), email, website, etc, and make sure to plan accordingly.

The pre-Black Friday period can also be a great way to build up owned audiences across key channels, such as by encouraging email subscribers to follow you on social media and vice-versa to make sure they don’t miss out on important information.

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4. Create a Strong Post-Purchase Experience

The customer journey doesn’t stop at the checkout.

A good post-purchase experience can turn a one-time customer into a loyal one, keeping them engaged and connected to your brand even after their product has arrived.

In fact, 90% of consumers say the post purchase experience is just as important as the quality of the products

A positive post-purchase experience involves:

Shipping and order updates
Utilising customer testimonials to build excitement
Offering product care, maintenance, and best-use tips
Clearly explaining your returns, refunds, and exchanges policy
Signposting to customer service in case they need it

Slow shipping and awkward returns are two big reasons for abandoned carts on Shopify, so getting those right is key to keeping and converting happy customers.

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5. Use Automatic Discounts

Codes and coupons add unnecessary steps in the customer journey, and extra steps provide more opportunities for your customers to abandon their cart or not engage with your sale in the first place.

Shopify Plus merchants can reduce any extra steps by using automatic discounts.

With 73% of Shopify Black Friday Cyber Monday sales made on mobile devices in 2023, it’s even more important than to think mobile-first when planning your customer’s experience.

Compared to desktop, codes and coupons are more difficult to enter on mobile, especially depending on screen size, whereas automatic discounts allow for frictionless shopping and faster checkouts.

Automatic discount codes mean you’re doing the work for the customer, leaving them to have an easier, less-complicated journey, resulting in more sales and a higher AOV.

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6. Stay on Top of Customer Service

With an influx of sales also comes an influx of questions, queries, and comments - all of which need to be dealt with in a swift and timely manner.

Unfortunately, the Black Friday Cyber Monday weekend isn’t known for letting you stick to a 9-5 work schedule. The faster you can deal with customer questions, the more likely they are to convert.

Equally, the more likely they are to recommend your store to their friends and family. Good customer service can really make or break a customer’s experience - even if they start with an issue.

Customers want to feel looked after, and if you can respond to a question quickly and effectively, you’re helping them feel like they’re in a safe pair of hands, so even if they have an issue with their eventual order, you’ll be there ready to sort it for them.

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7. Highlight Free Shipping

The biggest cause behind Shopify abandoned carts is extra costs - taking up almost 50% of responses to why a customer would leave items behind.

Why? Customers like to know what they’re spending.

If they’ve added $100 of items to their cart and got to checkout, they’re comfortable with spending $100. When another $5/$10 gets added on for shipping, tax, or admin fees, that stress can make them click off and head elsewhere.

Across Black Friday Cyber Monday, your customers will most likely be shopping from multiple stores - so hidden fees can quickly add up.

But another benefit of free shipping is that it creates an opportunity to bump up their order value.

Instead of offering free shipping on all orders, try offering it for orders above a certain spend, encouraging customers to add a few additional products to their cart.

Some websites, such as MyProtein, offer different benefits for different amounts of spending. For example, if you spend $50, you get a free gift. If you spend $100, you get free shipping and a free gift. If you spend $150, you get free shipping, a gift, and 30% off your next order.

The key is to look at what your normal order value is and put the incentive about 10-20% higher.

If you need any more proof about why shipping matters, just take a look at our Instagram comments.

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8. Utilise Upsells and Cross-sell Opportunities

Upselling is when you encourage customers to buy a more expensive version of products or add products onto their order to boost the total sale amount.

On the other hand, cross-selling involves showing your customers products that complement or benefit their original intended purchase.

We’ve just discussed how you can utilise free shipping to drive higher average order values, but you need to make the process of adding additional items simple and easy. For example, using product recommendations at checkout whilst letting the customer know how far off they are from receiving free-shipping.

The product recommendations need to be thought-through, showing either the most popular products in your store (upselling) or products that are frequently bought alongside the products already in their basket (cross-selling).

A clothing store may encourage customers to ‘buy the look’, recommending other items the model is wearing in the photo (cross-selling), whilst also showing some of the most popular items from their latest seasonal collection (upselling).

The aim is to position the recommendations as a benefit to the customer.

“You’re only $15 away from free shipping. Here are some products you might like”
“Other customers also bought”
“Add $10 more to unlock a free gift”

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9. Allow Customers to Buy Now, Pay Later

Allowing customers freedom with how they pay is a great way to remove stress from the checkout experience, lowering the chance of abandoned carts.

Buy now, pay later methods are already popular among 25% of Americans, with the market looking to reach over $39 billion by 2039.

How does it work?

Instead of paying in full, customers can pay a smaller amount in instalments - either then being charged interest or late fees depending on the company, plan, and total value of their basket.

For customers who are already spending hefty amounts on Black Friday, buy now, pay later methods allow them to still shop with you whilst delaying the costs until later.

It allows them to indulge in instant gratification whilst removing the stress of a big purchase - but it doesn’t just benefit them.

According to Shopify, buy now, pay later options also increase order value by up to 50% and decrease abandoned carts by 28%.

And don’t worry - you still get paid in full from the original purchase, but Shopify takes on the risk of the delayed payments.

You can set up a buy now, pay later options in your checkout experience with Shop Pay.

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10. Make your job easier with automations

As we’ve already stated, Black Friday isn’t known for letting Shopify merchants work a typical 9-5.

However, you can reclaim some time by setting up automations for key actions, allowing you to focus on the areas that need you most.

Shopify apps like Shopify Flow allow you to automate tasks using their low-code editor.

You can automate inventory tasks, stock alerts, customer service, marketing campaigns, and even fraud concerns - all with easy to use templates.

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Don’t work harder because you feel like you have to. Automate what you can to put more time back in your pocket, giving you more mental space to help drive further sales for your store.

Shopify Black Friday Cyber Monday FAQ

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When is Shopify Black Friday Cyber Monday 2024?

Black Friday 2024 is on Friday 29 November and Cyber Monday is on Monday 2nd December.

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What is the average discount offered by Shopify stores on Black Friday?

In 2022, data from Shopify Plus stores shows the average discount offered by Shopify merchants was 14.3%.

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What are the highest selling product categories across Shopify Black Friday Cyber Monday?

In 2023, the top product Shopify Black Friday Cyber Monday categories were:

Apparel & accessories
Health & beauty
Home & garden

How do I set up Buy Now, Pay Later methods for my Shopify store?

You can set up buy now, pay later options in your checkout experience with Shopify Shop Pay.

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What is the biggest cause of Shopify abandoned carts?

The biggest cause behind Shopify abandoned carts is extra costs being too high (shipping, tax, fees), followed by ‘the site wanted me to create an account’ and slow delivery.