Mobile devices dominated US Black Friday sales, driving 79 percent of all website traffic

A staggering amount of Black Friday shopping took place on mobile devices this year, accounting for 79 percent of all site traffic, according to the latest insights from Bluecore.

For the seventh consecutive year, the retail technology company studied consumers’ Black Friday shopping habits and purchases across 150 retail brands in seven retail categories, including apparel, footwear, sports and hobbies, home, jewelry and accessories, health and beauty, and department stores, taking a comprehensive overview at retailers performance over Black Friday 2024 compared to Black Friday 2023.

This Black Friday, 64 percent of online shoppers were new to retailers, reports Bluecore. Despite this influx of new customers, many retailers focused on re-engaging previous buyers and identified shoppers. Retailers now recognize 30 percent of their return shoppers (up from about 20 percent last year), and those who concentrated on encouraging repeat purchases from existing customers saw a notable increase in order values, with some experiencing an increase of up to 10 percent.

Growth in mobile shopping across retail categories

Looking at some of Bluecore’s Black Friday 2024 main findings, mobile devices accounted for a significant share of Black Friday online sales. Footwear retailers saw the highest percentage of mobile sessions from all the categories at 85 percent, while sporting goods retailers had the lowest mobile session rate at a still impressive 59 percent.

This Black Friday, retailers were able to identify close to 30 percent of their shoppers, a significant increase from just 20 percent last year, report Bluecore. However, 70 percent of Black Friday shoppers remain unidentified. Data found that retailers took different approaches when prioritizing new versus repeat shoppers for Black Friday sales.

Some retailers focused heavily on attracting new shoppers, with 78 percent of accessories customers, 72 percent of footwear shoppers, and 71 percent of home shoppers being first-time buyers. In contrast, other retailers concentrated their efforts on repeat customers, with 56 percent of department store shoppers, 46 percent of apparel shoppers, 42 percent of health and beauty shoppers, and 42 percent of sporting and hobbies shoppers being return customers.

Black Friday 2024 retailers identify 30 percent of customers

“This year’s data shows significant growth in mobile shoppers, as well as efforts by retailers to get existing shoppers to shop again,” said Jason Grunberg, CMO of Bluecore, in a statement. “We can see in the numbers that this approach makes more business sense than strategies that solely focus on customer acquisition. For the most part, retailers that prioritized their known shoppers and existing customers were those that saw an increase in order values.”

The study also found that some retailers experienced a growth in average order values (AOV), while others saw higher order volumes. However, only luxury retailers saw an increase in AOV and order volume. In terms of AOV by vertical, health and beauty saw the largest increase at 10 percent, followed by luxury with an 8 percent increase, sports and hobbies with 6 percent, and apparel with 0.3 percent. Footwear, accessories, department stores, and home and home improvement all saw a decline of 3 percent and 2 percent, respectively.

Regarding order volume by vertical, accessories led with a 20 percent increase, followed by department stores with 7 percent, luxury with 5 percent, and footwear with 1 percent, while home and home improvement, sports and hobbies, health and beauty, and apparel saw declines of 15 percent, 11 percent, 10 percent, and 4 percent respectively.

Driving repeat business: the key to higher order values

Higher session volumes led to more orders for retailers as well over Black Friday 2024, but not necessarily higher order values. Accessory retailers saw a 24 percent increase in online sessions, and department stores saw an 8 percent rise. While both saw more traffic and orders, their order values decreased. This suggests that driving traffic should be paired with efforts to strengthen customer relationships and increase order sizes.

“Considering the skyrocketing costs of new customer acquisition, retailers who can identify shoppers and turn one-time buyers into repeat customers will ultimately spend less to make more,” said Grunberg. “And now they have 64 percent more customers they can target with this goal in mind.”