It is the end of October, and traditional peak seasons such as Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and Christmas are about to arrive. Cross-border sellers are making intensive preparations in the hope of breaking the sales maze with the help of these big promotions. However, due to various uncertain factors, Amazon's fluctuating traffic has become a "thorn in the side" for sellers. In a blink of an eye, more than half a month has passed since the Amazon Prime members' autumn promotion. I still remember that during the autumn promotion, although the overall promotion effect was not as good as Prime Day in July, some Amazon sellers still successfully achieved an increase in both orders and traffic. However, after the autumn promotion ended, the joy of increased traffic seemed to disappear completely. Since mid-October, many US sellers have reported that they have fallen into a dilemma of plummeting traffic and halving sales: "The traffic has plummeted after the autumn promotion, and even if you raise the bid, there are still few impressions." "The order volume has been like a roller coaster recently, either reaching the peak or hitting the bottom." “I can’t spend as much money on advertising as I want, and traffic is dropping drastically…” One of the sellers even mentioned that the sales of the product in the past week was a Waterloo, the order volume and ranking dropped , and the increased advertising budget could not be fully used. Based on this, the seller believed that this represented a decline in the overall traffic of the platform. It was observed that the sales of sellers on Amazon US site declined most significantly from October 20 to 27. Based on the feedback from sellers, the main reasons may be the following three points: Amazon's autumn sale ended on October 9. As usual, there will be a "traffic decline period" after the sale. Amazon's Black Friday sale in the United States will be held from November 21 to December 2. Currently, overseas consumers are more inclined to temporarily stop shopping and wait for the new sale to come and buy the products they need at a more favorable price. The 2024 US presidential election has entered its final sprint . Although the voting day for the US presidential election is November 5, early voting has already begun in many US states. According to foreign media reports, as of October 27, more than 41 million voters across the United States have voted in advance for the 2024 presidential election. Some sellers believe that the increased attention on the US election has made many American people "uninterested in shopping", which in turn has affected the sales of products on local e-commerce platforms to a certain extent. 3. Multiple e-commerce platforms share market traffic Platforms such as Temu, TikTok Shop, SHEIN and AliExpress are engaged in a fierce battle with Amazon for market traffic. According to industry sources, Temu kicked off the Black Friday promotion on October 20. Some Temu sellers who participated in the promotion reported that their sales doubled, while their net profit was also compressed due to the discounts. One seller analyzed that after consumers see products with huge discounts on platforms such as Temu, it will be difficult to attract consumers to buy the same products on Amazon if they do not have a lower price, and some of the traffic will inevitably be diverted away. As November approaches, not only Temu but other e-commerce platforms’ Black Friday and Cyber Monday events are about to start. As we all know, Black Friday has always been a battleground for overseas e-commerce platforms. According to Bain's latest research report, US retail sales are expected to increase by 5% year-on-year to $75 billion during the Black Friday to Cyber Monday period in 2024, breaking the US holiday season sales record. At the same time, consumer spending during the holidays is expected to increase, with sales expected to increase by 2.3% to 3.3% between November and January. In order to seize the traffic during this sales peak, not only are the sellers preparing in full swing, but the platforms are also eyeing the market covetously. According to industry sources, the Black Friday and Cyber Monday promotion times announced by major e-commerce platforms are as follows (taking the US site as an example) : Temu: October 20 to December 4 (47 days in total) Best Buy: November 8 to December 20 (43 days) TikTok Shop: November 14 to December 2 (20 days in total) AliExpress: 3 days of preheating from November 19 to 21; 12 days of official sales from November 22 to December 3 (15 days in total) Amazon: November 21 to December 2 (12 days in total)
As can be seen from the above, although Amazon's Black Friday Cyber Monday this year has been extended to 12 days (7 days and 10 days in 2022 and 2023 respectively), its event duration is still the shortest among the currently public platforms, while Temu has the longest event period, lasting 47 days .
When it comes to the popularity of these platforms during Black Friday and Cyber Monday, apart from Amazon, the most popular ones are Temu and TikTok Shop. Temu: Warm-up flow is average It is learned that Temu’s Black Friday promotion entered the warm-up period on October 20, and it has been more than a week since then. Although some Amazon sellers attribute the recent decline in platform traffic to the start of Temu Black Friday, based on industry feedback over the past seven days, while some Temu sellers said that their order volume has doubled, more sellers reported that Temu's traffic during the Black Friday warm-up period was average and product sales did not show a significant increase. In this regard, some industry insiders analyzed that the popularity of Temu's Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales reached its peak in 2023. Due to the uneven quality of goods, the subsequent promotions are becoming less attractive to consumers. However, some sellers believe that the appeal of low-priced products in today's economic environment of consumption downgrade is immeasurable. This year, the traffic peak of Temu Black Friday and Cyber Monday will arrive during the official sales period (i.e. November) , which will still have a significant impact on Amazon's Black Friday traffic. It is worth mentioning that apart from the order volume, sellers in the industry did not have high expectations for the profits of Temu’s Black Friday Cyber Monday products: more sellers hoped to make small profits but quick turnover during the event . TikTok Shop: Highly anticipated According to public information, TikTok Shop's Black Friday Cyber Monday promotion in 2024 will be held from November 14 to December 2, lasting nearly 20 days, covering Amazon's traditional Black Friday Cyber Monday event schedule. To encourage more sellers to participate in this promotion, on the one hand, TikTok Shop provides three major content e-commerce features. Participants in the million live broadcast rooms, key live broadcast rooms, short videos and live broadcast challenges will have the opportunity to win traffic subsidies and large promotional coupons; on the other hand, during Black Friday and Cyber Monday, the platform will also provide resource support for merchants participating in the Zeus Almost and explosive product incubation plans. As of October, the topic #tiktokshopblackfriday on the TikTok platform has been viewed more than 2 billion times, and the number of products has exceeded 200,000. With the support of top social media traffic, many sellers have high expectations for the event. At the same time, some sellers believe that TikTok Shop’s Black Friday in the US is quite a “forcing growth” posture: facing external competitive pressure and tightening US policies, TikTok Shop has entrusted the task of a 10-fold growth of US$17.5 billion to the supply of goods. If the platform ultimately fails to successfully explode orders, the sellers will have to bear the consequences of the massive inventory. But overall, the Black Friday Cyber Monday events on major e-commerce platforms have not yet ended or even started, so everything is possible. Judging from the promotion duration, this year's Black Friday and Cyber Monday promotions on major e-commerce platforms are relatively long, which is undoubtedly a crucial order grabbing node in the year-end peak season for cross-border sellers. Here we remind you to pay more attention to the latest promotion rules and welfare benefits of each platform so as to better prepare for the battle. In addition to the above platforms, which other platforms have announced the promotion time for Black Friday Cyber Monday this year? What are your expectations for Black Friday Cyber Monday? Welcome to discuss in the comments section~
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