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Crafting the perfect BCFM offer
How to print money by keeping it simple in Q4
Hi everyone,
Thanks for stopping by for another bite to chew on.
Black Friday, Cyber Monday. The biggest weekend in e-commerce.
The kick-off to the holiday shopping season can make or break an entire quarter, if not the year.
That’s why it’s the most important campaign of the year for most DTC brands.
And that’s why it’s so important to get it right.
With so much on the line, operators and marketers tend to start planning for BFCM pretty early (I bet you’re thinking about it already).
That level of prep and the size of the prize can sometimes lead to analysis paralysis.
Brands want to get this right SO BAD and there are so many options when it comes to your ads, marketing, offering, and UX that it can be overwhelming.
So today we’re going to share what we’ve learned from our own BFCM efforts over the years…
Hopefully, we can help save you some heartburn. And maybe make you more money.
On the menu
Leverage your learnings
KISS
Offer and discount frameworks
Leverage your learnings
What we mean by this is - don’t start taking wild swings around BFCM when it comes to your ads, offers, or CRO/UX.
This is not the time to take a big swing or lean into new A/B tests.
This is where you should apply what you’ve learned through the first 10 months of the year.
Spend your time and energy making sure everything is optimized and running smoothly, not adding more unknown variables to the mix. There will be plenty of time for experimentation later.
So by now, you should understand your key messaging, and your site CRO/checkout UX should be dialed in and friction-free.
That’s the first step.
The next step is to go through your numbers.
You DO want to offer something big and juicy around BFCM.
It should be your best sale of the year.
You’re battling for people’s attention and wallets and the expectation is that the deal will be the best of the year. If your deal disappoints, you may see buyers move on.
But you DON’T want to lose a bunch of money because of it.
You still need to consider your offer in terms of your inventory and contribution margin —>
What discount can your products reasonably absorb?
Do different SKUs have different margins requiring different discount levels?
Is there a product you need to blow out / is overstocked / going out of season soon?
Can you add things that add perceived value but don’t cut into your margin (like a free gift with purchase?)
Meaning - do some homework on the spreadsheet side of things. Don’t slap mega deals across your site arbitrarily.
Tool of the Week - Sendlane
We recently doubled our retention sales by cutting our monthly email sends by 60%.
We know - the conventional thinking is you need to send MORE emails to make more revenue from retention.
And before we moved to Sendlane, we were just kind of doing that blindly. Our email strategy was mostly spray and pray.
But once we consolidated our SMS and Email with Sendlane, they worked with us to identify waste in our efforts and identify key areas of opportunity.
Like…discovering SMS was a huge conversion driver for us. We increased our text volume 10X and saw sales explode.
Then they dug in with us and helped us discover how to effectively tailor our campaigns, going from the typical inbox offer stuff to a “how the heck did you know that?” level of user personalization.
So that’s how we 2X’d our retention $ while cutting our email send volume from 8 million to 3.2 million per month.
If you’re looking a killer retention platform that is actually a valuable growth partner, you can’t go wrong with Sendlane.
They have some of the best customer service we’ve seen in a SaaS tool and their tech just keeps getting better and better.
Go here for your free demo and find out if they can help you send smarter, not harder.
Keep It Simple Stupid
We’ll kick this section off with a story.
A few years back, a brand we know offered a tiered discount during Black Friday.
It was a base discount (for most customers) + an additional 10% off (for first responders and veterans, who had to prove they were a first responder or vet).
They had some good reasons to try this. Veterans made up a solid segment of their customers and their ICP liked to “support the troops”.
But it was a disaster.
It created nothing but anger and confusion. Their customer service department spent all of their time fielding angry emails and calls. Several of their agents broke down in tears because of the vicious backlash.
That’s how much shoppers HATE complicated offers.
This is the worst-case scenario of course. In most instances, people will just bounce and spend their money somewhere else if there’s confusion or friction in your deal.
The key to crafting a simple, but effective offer:
Your deal should be understandable in a split second
Avoid multiple tiers and conditions
Does it pass the “can my Grandma understand this?” test
Consider your brand’s historical discounting strategy
Go with things that have worked previously
Can you explain your deal to someone without a lot of small print or caveats? Then you’ve probably got something that works.
If you’re a premium brand that rarely discounts, be sure to take that into account because you probably won’t need to offer too much.
Alternatively, if you’re a discount-heavy brand, you’ll need to figure out how to create a bigger or better deal to make a dent.
Offer and discount frameworks
“But I want to offer personalized sales and holiday gift bundles and escalating discount tiers based on spend volume and…”
Yeah, we get it. It’s very tempting to pull some fancy stuff during BFCM.
And you can execute these things.
But it’s going to have to be done as cleanly as possible to work.
Any added friction and you’ll lose some percentage of your sales.
So if you haven’t deployed a dynamic bundle builder on your site that rewards higher spending with better deals before, don’t do it now.
If you’re offering special BFCM pre-made bundles, you better know that the bundles make sense from a customer perspective (the products are all relevant and complementary) and it better be very easy to “click-to-buy” each bundle.
Oh, and the perceived value of the bundles better be extremely apparent in your assets and your messaging.
If you insist on offering personalized deals, try to keep it as straightforward as possible.
Segment your customer base into different behavioral buckets →
High-value customers who haven't purchased recently
Loyal, high-value customers who consistently make purchases
Customers who haven't purchased in a long time
People on your list who have not purchased yet
Create dedicated deals for each segment. Be more aggressive with dormant buyers and keep it basic/simple with your loyalists.
Implement this strategy through your email/SMS segments, targeted landing pages, and, if you have the ability, personalized website experiences.
Now, you really need your ducks in a row to execute this 👆properly, so tread lightly.
For those who want to embrace the KISS principle, here are some proven BFCM offers to consider:
Percentage off sale (site-wide) or per category/SKU
Free gifts with purchase
Buy One, Get One (BOGO)
Free shipping
These offers almost always print money and they are very easy to understand. Most brands can’t go wrong sticking with the basics.
The more involved options:
Bundle sales: Include best sellers + products you want to clear out / get sampled
Multiple bundles: Offer a few specific bundles to cater to different customer preferences
Tiered promos: "Spend $X, save Y%" with increasing discounts for higher order values
Buy X, Get Y free: Promote complementary services or add-ons like gift wrapping or product personalization
If you want to get sophisticated and you have the data, tech, and team that can pull this stuff off, then there are big opportunities for incremental sales and profit.
One last note - don’t start your BFCM sale too early.
We’ve seen some brands simply start their sale on November 1, but that’s going to take a really big bite out of your margin.
Not only will the deal no longer feel “special”, but a lot of shoppers will simply wait until the end of the month to see if it will improve anyways.
The earliest we launch is the week of Black Friday.
That’s when shoppers are primed to buy and it limits your discounting/margin depletion to only a quarter of the month. Anything beyond that will likely see diminishing returns.
Put it together
Like we said at the beginning, it’s possible you’re overthinking Black Friday.
The opportunity is huge, so that can create pressure to take big swings, try new things.
But for most brands in most situations, you should stick with what you know.
Limit experimentation, lower friction, and do what has worked in the past.
Apply what you’ve learned already and execute as best as possible.
Make sure your offer is obvious, the perceived value is clear, and the UX is smooth.
If you’re going for something beyond the basics, be confident you can pull it off. The upside is big, but so is the downside if you get in over your head.
Oh and don’t needlessly extend the length of your sale to the rest of the month.
That’s it.
Now get out there and crush it.
All the best,
Ron and Ash