MarketLive, the leading Total Commerce platform for high-growth merchants, today released retail performance statistics for its platform customers during the four-day shopping weekend starting at Thanksgiving.
An analysis of industry statistics shows that MarketLive customers followed an industry trend of slower growth on Thanksgiving and Black Friday, but then increased revenue trends over the holiday weekend.
As shoppers have been trained to expect extended offers and promotions, beyond just those provided on Thanksgiving and Black Friday, the revenue gains for the weekend have spread over the four days.
Despite initial decreases in Average Order Value, MarketLive’s customers enjoyed double-digit revenue, strong add to cart growth and traffic growth to compensate, and a doubling of revenues coming from mobile.
MarketLive’s customers grew 2014 revenues an average of 16.2 percent higher during the four day Thanksgiving weekend, while average order values averaged just 3.2 percent higher for MarketLive customers and actually went negative industry-wide (as reported by Custora and IBM).
In the two days before Thanksgiving, MarketLive merchants grew revenue an average of 20%, as compared to an industry average of 11% growth in pre holiday spending reported by ComScore. One reason for MarketLive’s superior results is sales revenues originating from a mobile device was 50 percent – nearly double that of the industry.
“We coached our customers and cautioned the industry that pre-empting Black Friday with early discounts is not healthy,” said Ken Burke, founder and CEO of MarketLive, Inc. “This year saw an unprecedented number of retailers ‘jumping the gun’ on holiday sales and discounts which drove pre- Thanksgiving sales. It also had the effect of decreasing average order value across the industry. Fortunately, our MarketLive customers held AOV at a growth rate, not a decline, overall and had very strong performance in mobile revenue, realizing another year of strong overall revenue gains.”
A summary of results from the MarketLive Holiday Shopping Index are included below:
Thanksgiving Black Friday Saturday/Sunday
– Revenue 11.4% increase 16.2% increase 19% increase
– Website Visits 17.8% increase 16.4% increase 15% increase