More than half of U.S. consumers reported completing at least half of their holiday gift buying online in 2024, according to new survey data from Digital Commerce 360 and Bizrate Insights.
Digital Commerce 360 and Bizrate Insights surveyed 1,005 U.S. online shoppers to learn more about their holiday spending this season.
By early December, after Cyber Monday, most respondents (57.23%) had completed at least half of their holiday gift buying. Just 5.71% of respondents hadn’t done any holiday gift buying.
How Thanksgiving influences holiday gift buying
The majority of respondents (81.7%) started their holiday gift buying before Thanksgiving.
More than a quarter (26.46%) even started before September, though the largest portion of respondents said they started in November (but still pre-Thanksgiving).
Diving deeper into specific days, we asked if consumers shopped online on any of the days from the Wednesday pre-Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday. More than half of them (55.71%) shopped on Black Friday. Meanwhile, more than a third shopped online for Cyber Monday (38.46%).
Of those days, the fewest respondents shopped online that Sunday (20.75%). Additionally, 13.29% didn’t shop online at all in the six-day stretch.
Why consumers shopped online during the Cyber 5
Among the respondents who shopped online during the Cyber 5, 40.56% picked which retailer to purchase from based on free shipping. Second to that was appealing promotions (34.97%).
In other words, the deals might be good, but these consumers aren’t paying delivery fees. The only other response that more than 30% of consumers selected was that retailers they shopped from had products in stock that these consumers wanted (31.12%).
The Cyber 5 refers to Thanksgiving and the four days that follow.
And free shipping wasn’t just the most appealing offer during the Cyber 5. About a third of respondents (31.82%) only made purchases that came with free shipping. And just over another third of respondents (36.02%) made most or almost all of their purchases with free shipping.
How consumers shopped during the Cyber 5
More than a third of consumers (38.81%) made purchases for themselves during this year’s Cyber 5.
And about a third (33.10%) price-checked an item on Amazon before making a purchase. Similarly, about a quarter (24.83%) price-checked an item at one or more online retailers — other than Amazon — before completing a purchase.
When it came to mobile shopping, more than a quarter (26.22%) used their mobile devices to purchase from a retailer’s website. Similarly, just under a quarter (23.43%) used a retailer’s mobile app.
The omnichannel experience played a role in holiday gift buying, too, though not at late-pandemic-era levels.
17.72% of respondents checked online for product availability at a nearby store. 15.27% actually placed orders online for pickup at nearby stores. And 10.49% placed an online order for curbside delivery.
Speed was a key part of the fulfillment experience, too, as 12% paced an online order for same-day delivery.
Conveniences — and inconveniences — of Cyber 5 holiday shopping
Additionally, a third (33.92%) of shoppers checked for coupons or promotions when shopping during the Cyber 5. More than a quarter (26.11%) shopped on marketplaces such as Amazon, eBay and Etsy that offer products from multiple sellers.
About a fifth of respondents searched for retail sites with free shipping (21.56%) and bought less because prices seemed higher due to inflation (19.58%). As far as shipping goes, 14.57% encountered retailers offering slower shipping for an incentive such as a gift card or coupon. A similar amount abandoned a cart entirely after finding out the retailer didn’t offer free shipping (14.1%).
18.41% of shoppers encountered messages encouraging early shopping to avoid out-of-stock items. And on that note, 14.8% of shoppers abandoned a site because a product was out of stock. Meanwhile, a similar amount (14.69%) said they couldn’t find certain products wherever they looked. And 12% said they came across more messaging than usual about potentially out-of-stock products.
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