The Most Profitable Days In Your Holiday Sales Calendar in Q421

In 2020, e-commerce sales in the US saw significant growth compared to previous years. This growth was accelerated due to the pandemic. At the end of 2021, e-commerce sales in the US will also reach a significant number, according to the forecasts. 

Data from eMarketer revealed that e-commerce sales in the US during 2021 will reach $908.73 billion. If you also own an eCommerce business and are looking to take advantage of the holiday season this year, you must target the most profitable days. 

When planning e-commerce activities and campaigns for 2021, you may want to concentrate most of your efforts towards the end of the coming year. As Q4 is jam-packed with big sales events such as Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Singles’ Day and Christmas, Q4 may feel like a sprint from the planning perspective. 

To save you some time, we put together an ecommerce holiday calendar with a quick summary of dates and holidays to make 2021 your most profitable year yet.

Scroll down to find out.

Halloween – October 31

Target audience: North America and some Asian, European, and Oceanian countries.

In a holiday sales calendar, Halloween itself isn’t a major shopping day. However, it’s the point at which any costumes, candy and spooky decor that didn’t sell earlier in the month will go on sale. Despite the Covid-19 pandemic, the average spending per buyer increased in 2020 to $92.12 during the sales day. This was the highest avg. spending recorded, according to Thebalance. 

Many marketers and shop owners tend to encourage social media by running special promos on costumes or decorations, or sharing how their brands celebrate Halloween.

11.11 Global Shopping Festival 

Target audience: almost across the globe

The world’s biggest online shopping day is Singles’ Day. It takes place on 11 November in China but presents huge sales opportunities on an international scale. Last year shoppers spent $38bn during Alibaba’s 11.11. shopping festival. For comparison, Amazon sells nearly half of this sum in an entire quarter.

The AliExpress WW important dates for the 11.11 sale:

Please take these dates into account when planning activities:

• Warm-up: October 28 (00:00 PT) – November 10 (23:59 PT)
• Sale: November 11 (00:00 PT) – November 12 (23:59 PT)
• Post-sale: November 13 (00:00 PT) – November 15 (23:59 PT)

There are two key actions on this sales period — adding goods to the cart and activating a coupon. However, these actions must be taken during pre-sale. Moreover, webmasters will only receive their commission if their shoppers pay for their carts during the main sales period. 

Target action attribution during the sale follows a first-cookie-win rule. 

BUT: if webmasters lead the shopper to different goods, each of them will get their commission.

Black Friday – Nov 26 & Cyber Monday – Nov 29

Target audience: almost across the globe

Black Friday is the main event of the best selling season of the year, also known as the sales season, the holiday season or simply Q4. 

According to Adobe’s report, people spent over $9 billion on Black Friday in 2020, a 21.6% increase over 2019.

According to reports, Cyber Monday was recorded as the biggest spending day, accounting for $10.84 billion of sales alone.

Black Friday traditionally starts the weekend after Thanksgiving in the US. That means that Black Friday 2021 falls on 26 November. Cyber Monday follows right on its heels just three days later on Monday 29 November. 

Those are the “technical” dates at least, and it’s well worth preparing for. Retailers usually  start taking advantage of early promotional tactics to win over customers long before Thanksgiving weekend. 

We will inform you about the participants closer to the date, but for reference, here is a list of the retailers who offered some of the biggest and best deals in 2020. Stay tuned!

Christmas Eve and Day, December 24–25

Target audience: almost across the world

These dates mark a religious and cultural holiday for billions of people around the world who celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. Christmas may be becoming more commercial every year, yet it’s still a family holiday, so base your marketing efforts on heart-warming ideas and wishes.

According to the Statista report on Christmas, total holiday retail sales in 2020 reached about 750 billion U.S. dollars. A report on Christmas spending found that there was a 3.6% year-over-year growth in total spending in 2020.