BFCM Testing for Ecommerce Advertising

Q4 talk already?!

Ready or not, it’s coming… And we’re going to do everything we can to get you and your team prepped for another strong BFCM & Q4 in DTC and ecommerce. We’ll be posting some of this to the blog, but most of this Q4 & BFCM GOLD info is in our ad buying community - Foxwell Founders.

So how can you prep for Q4? Testing, testing, testing. The more you test, the more data you have to KNOW what the right course of action is for your brand, because every brand and every industry varies greatly from one to another. Having this data helps us to make decisions based on past performance, not guesses, therefore we can better serve our customer the ad, the offer, and the experience they really want so that buying from us this Q4 is an absolute NO-BRAINER.

If there’s one piece of advice that we give ourselves every year in preparation for a profitable BFCM – ensure you have a solid plan for your holiday promotions, including revenue targets, daily efficiency targets, and inventory planning. Set clear expectations across the team. Setting these expectations upfront helps the team stay confident and aggressive in their execution, rather than getting nervous as the holiday season approaches.

What we’ve testing in Q3 to prep our brands for BFCM:

• Offers

• Landing pages

• Ad creatives

  • Creative types/diversity

  • Hooks

  • Video lengths

  • Video styles

  • Creators

  • Graphic styles

  • Types of images

• Ad account structure

• Audience/targeting

• Spend

• Early holiday sales/testing (pre-BFCM)

Once you’ve tested and have learnings — then what?

• Offers

  • If you’ve found an offer that converts with your audience - consider using that discount or a variation of it for BFCM

  • Is it sitewide or on specific collections only? The more sitewide the discount can be, the simpler it is and easier it is for customers to understand and convert quickly

  • Is it simple? Easy to understand within 2 seconds?

  • Is there a discount code or is the discount auto-applied?

  • Is the sale on the home page/landing page? In the sticky banner? Or just on the ad creative/copy?

• Landing pages

  • Is it simple? Does it explain the product and overcome any obstacles as immediate as possible?

  • What content is “above the fold”?

  • Can this landing page be used as-is for BFCM/sales OR can it be tweaked slightly to have everything the same PLUS the sale/holiday info?

  • Can the user add to cart and purchase in as few clicks as possible? (Ideally less than 5 clicks)

• Ad creatives

  • When you find winning creative - keep using it

  • Use evergreen content for BFCM

    • Use the ad completely as-is

    • Use the same creative with sale/holiday/gifting ad copy (new post ID)

    • Use the same creative with a sale banner/overlay

    • Use the same creative concept and all the same shots (ESPECIALLY the same hook), but reshoot with holiday theme or with an additional mention of the sale/gifting/holiday

• Ad account structure & audience/targeting

  • If it’s working in Q1-Q3, it will likely work in Q4

  • Keep some evergreen campaigns/audiences ON during BFCM. Your top performers the rest of the year will also likely be top performing campaigns/audiences during Q4

  • Remember that customer purchase intent is higher overall - so higher CTRs, CVRs, etc. — the copy/creative/campaign structure/audiences don’t have to be BFCM/Q4 specific

  • What worked in previous years during Q4/BFCM? If you’re open to still testing some during BFCM, try these audiences:

    • Large or small lookalike of past BFCM or November/December purchases from last 3 years

    • After the sale has been on for 2-3 days, a Large or Small lookalike of purchasers last 3 days

    • Online shopping or sale interest audiences

• Ad account spend

  • Be aggressive with top-of-funnel spend in September and October to fill the holiday sales funnel, even if it means running at lower efficiencies in the short-term. This upfront investment will pay off during the peak holiday period, as the brands will have a larger pool of potential customers to convert and customers who already are aware of, and ideally interested in, the brand and are ready to convert without needing lots of research and decision-making before converting

  • Remember that retargeting when customer intent to purchase is higher during BFCM will be cheaper than true cold targeting/prospecting. Take advantage of this!

• Test early to gather data

  • If you can, test and measure the incremental impact of early holiday spend, potentially through holdout tests, to understand the true contribution. This helps the brands understand whether the increased top-of-funnel spend is truly driving additional sales and profit, or if it is simply cannibalizing existing demand. By understanding the incremental impact, the brands can make more informed decisions about the optimal level of early holiday spend

Not in our community already? You NEED to be. Click here to learn more. (Or email andrew at foxwelldigital dot com and put “Discount” in the subject line.)