Tips to optimize your pricing/discounts for Cyber Monday

Black Friday and Cyber Monday are fast approaching, but with more than a month to go, there is still time to optimize your pricing and discount strategy! Despite impacts from inflation, supply chain issues, and more, Cyber Monday remains the biggest retail holiday of the year. According to Shopify, worldwide Shopify sales between Black Friday and Cyber Monday 2021 were up 23% year-over-year.

In the coming weeks, brands will be working hard to prepare their sites by preparing their marketing and communication strategy, fortifying their sites and improving site performance, and more. One key part of success is nailing your pricing and discount strategy, both on the actual day and in the weeks following. BFCM is too big to guess on your pricing and discount strategy — instead, you should enter this period with a deliberate promotional strategy.

1. Set goals in order to build a discount strategy around them

Before choosing a discount, decide on your goals for Black Friday / Cyber Monday period.

• Are you focused on maximizing sales and building buzz around the brand, with the intent on carrying forward sales after the holiday?

• Or are you more focused on achieving specific revenue or profit targets?

From there, some back of the envelope math can help you understand how to achieve these targets. For example, if you’re working towards a specific revenue target of $X, which scenarios will allow you to achieve that target? If you assume the same number of visitors as previous Cyber Mondays (plus any increase in visitors YOY), can you achieve your targets assuming your current conversion rate and AOV? If not, the next step is to find the discount “sweet spot” where you can boost conversion rate by enough to offset the discount and grow revenue per site visitor. This is where A/B testing your discount strategy can come into play!

2. A/B test your discount strategy

A/B testing can help you find the right Cyber Monday discount offer by allowing you to quantify a discount’s impact to conversion rate, AOV, and revenue/profit. Understanding the impact of a discount will help you decide on BFCM promotion structure with confidence that you can meet your goals.

Brands can use Intelligems to split test discounts, including different:

• Discount values

• Discount types ($ or % off discounts)

• Discounts across specific categories or collections vs. site-wide discounts

• And even different discount structures (bundles, volume discounts, and more!)

3. Consider incorporating discount offers that boost AOV

Exploring alternative discount structures that boost order value can allow your brand to offer an attractive Cyber Monday discount while further growing revenue per visitor. Compelling volume discounts (discounts with minimum order value or quantities) can allow you to boost both conversion and AOV.

Intelligems’ volume discount feature allows stores to promote bulk ordering of a single SKU or promote larger cart subtotals across multiple SKUs. The feature is highly customizable and allows configuration of:

• Eligible products

• Thresholds (cart subtotal or quantities)

• UI that automatically update with the discount (like a progress bar or upsell buttons on the PDP)

4. Ensure a seamless discount experience

Reducing friction at checkout for customers is a key part of increasing conversion, reducing cart abandonment, and reaching your BFCM goals. One tactic to decrease friction is removing the need for discount codes by applying discounts automatically. This can be achieved using built-in features like checkout scripts (available to Shopify Plus), but can also be rolled out using the Intelligems app. Intelligems can be used to apply discounted prices and volume discounts, even without running a split test — this can be a great way to apply these features for a limited time with low customer friction. 

5. Prepare for post-holiday traffic by optimizing your pricing

While you may be focused on the Big Day, all of your marketing and promotional efforts can lead to an increase in traffic after Cyber Monday. You can use the time leading up to Black Friday to run split tests on your product prices to ensure your pricing is optimized to meet your goals — that way, all the post-holiday traffic will see your store at it’s best!

Using Intelligems you can test:

• Product and compare-at prices

• Shipping rates and free shipping thresholds

• Additional features, like subscription prices and volume discounts

6. Monitor competitor price changes leading up to and after Cyber Monday

Being aware of any pricing changes in your industry can help your store stay competitive and maintain your positioning in the industry. Intelligems’ “Price scraper” feature can provide updates whenever any target stores change product prices to ensure you’re in the loop!