Pamela SapioThe 2024 Black Friday and Cyber Monday (BFCM) weekend has come and gone—and it was definitely one for the record books.
According to the 2024 Holiday Shopping Trends Report from Adobe Analytics, consumers spent a whopping $10.8 billion on Black Friday (up 10.2% from the previous year) and $13.3 billion on Cyber Monday (up 7.3% from 2023).
Not surprisingly, online shopping reigned supreme, with mobile spending not only overtaking desktop spending but also boasting a higher conversion rate throughout the weekend.
So, why are we bringing all of this up now, in January?
Because the 2025 holiday shopping season will be here before you know it. And if your BFCM sales fell short of your goals for 2024, John has a strategy that will help turn things around.
It has everything to do with time lag.
If you have been running paid ads for a while, you are likely familiar with the concept of time lag. Time lag is the period of time between when a user first clicks on your ad and when they actually make a purchase.
Why does this delay happen? Because, as we all know, the majority of shoppers rarely convert on the first click; they generally take the time to browse a bit more, visit your website, compare other brands and other products, and ultimately (hopefully) return to buy from your site.
But time lag is not the same for everyone. In fact, it will vary considerably based on your product, your industry, and your customer sales cycle.
For example, if you are using a subscription model, you will have a longer sales cycle because it takes longer for a person to sign up for a new (recurring) subscription than it does to make, for example, a $30 coffee purchase.
All of this is to say that if you are looking to maximize conversions over the next BFCM weekend, paying attention to time lag is the key.
Time lag tells you when to start your BFCM campaigns.
John uses time lag as an indicator to tell him when to launch his BFCM campaigns in order to “warm up” the largest number of people in the days and weeks leading up to the holiday shopping weekend.
“My thought process is always down to the time lag,” he explains.
According to him, it takes an average of seven days (to convert) when a customer knows about you, and 14 days when they may not. In the Google Ads Performance Max campaign example he uses in the video, the time lag is actually 15 days. This helps him gauge how much time he has before Black Friday to reach more customers and maximize sales.
That 15 days can only be extended, says John, when you consider this is inbound traffic but also remarketing of warm. “Which means by virtue, if you’re starting on Meta [Ads], you’re probably more like 18 to 21 days,” he explains. (Remember, Meta Ads is really good at generating demand, while Google Ads is better at capturing demand.)
The takeaway
Yep, it’s really that simple!
In order to have the most amount of people warmed up before Black Friday and Cyber Monday, John says you must think about time lag.
From there, you can determine exactly when to start and stop your BFCM paid ad campaigns so you can maximize conversions during the next holiday sales event.
