From Marvel’s multiverse to The Sandman’s Dreaming, parallel worlds are having a cultural moment. Working in PR and social media during a long, hot summer can feel like an alternate reality: one where thoughts of hosepipe bans and melting roads are replaced by a focus on Christmas gifts and a winter wonderland of seasonal features.
But our world’s traditions of Christmas in July followed by a serious August sell-in are fast adopting customs from yet another realm – one where Jeff Bezos, rather than Santa Claus, is the man of the season.
Exactly a calendar month before Christmas, Black Friday hits on 25th November, rapidly followed by Cyber Monday. There are also rumours of an Amazon Prime Day event in October. Always of importance, these events have taken on even greater significance this year when squeezed households are in search of a deal.
We’ve already moved way past the point of Black Friday being ‘an American thing’. In 2021, the UK accounted for over 10 per cent of all global Black Friday searches online, but there are still myths to bust, including the role PR has to play in maximising brand opportunities around these huge retail events.
We all remember the viral videos of frenzied shoppers fighting over flatscreen TVs, and consumer tech remains a key category for Prime Day and Black Friday deals, but these sales events go far beyond tech, or indeed big-ticket items. July saw the biggest Amazon Prime Day event ever here in the UK; leaving aside Amazon’s own products, the bestselling categories were hardware, skincare, make-up and spirits (there’s a great Venn diagram to be made of that selection…) More than 70 per cent of UK consumer brands participated in Black Friday 2021 and that figure is set to rise.
Demographic misconceptions persist, too. Yes, younger generations are more comfortable using technology, but it’s the older demographic that has more to spend. For example, Amazon stats show 80 per cent of Prime users are aged 18-34, but the average Amazon customer is a 46-year-old woman.
Media coverage reflects this reality. As we write this, titles are starting to publish their first pieces on Black Friday 2022. Kudos to the e-commerce team at Hearst media, as Good Housekeeping is currently topping Google searches for the topic.
It’s not surprising when the size of the prize for media is enormous. Affiliate income isn’t a nice to have – it’s now crucial to survival. Mainstream media websites publish hundreds of stories around a single sales event, while even specialist sites are increasing affiliate revenues by writing highly targeted stories. (One lovely example is Space.com focusing on deals on everything from telescopes to Lego spaceship sets).
Future plc, the UK’s dominant specialist media player in the UK, reaches over 400 million people worldwide through its portfolio of over 250 brands and drove £2.7 million of UK sales from the previous Amazon Prime Day event.
Affiliate income isn’t the only thing the media takes away from big sales events such as Black Friday, either. They gather lots of juicy data about their audiences’ preferences that influence the brands and topics it will cover for the date of the next deal, as well as the search terms it will target. As an aside, we realise how infuriating this can be for brands trying to carve a specific niche for themselves, only to find themselves lumped into a generic search term. Don’t blame the PR or even the media; it’s what the majority of consumers are searching for.
With journalists having huge targets around these sales events, PR has a crucial role to play – from understanding how insanely busy the media will be around these sales events to providing timely information on deals from their clients. Framing deals as stories rather than just raw details also helps media create richer, more engaging content.
We worked with British brand, Cambridge Audio to promote a deal on its excellent Melomania 1+ earphones. With coverage in audio, health and fitness, lifestyle, music and technology media, a huge range of consumers were introduced to both the deal and the brand. The result? The earphones sat among the most popular products across the two Amazon Prime Days, sat alongside much bigger brands.
Understanding all these opportunities – even the everyday retail ones as well as these big tentpole events – is key to our world, not something from another universe. Though it would be lovely right now if the occasional blast of cold air were to travel across from Christmas world every now and then….
