With consumers shifting their spending to key seasonal sales moments, merchants are extending their discount events, with Amazon dropping hints for “early Prime Day deals” more than a month before the occasion.
Earlier this month, the eCommerce giant teased these preemptive offers in a blog post, saying, “Check back in the upcoming weeks for previews and sneak peeks of the deals you can expect, as well as any early Prime Day deals.”
Additionally, several publications have already begun highlighting steep summer discounts on popular items on the marketplace in advance of the event, numbering more than 50.
Across the retail industry, key players are defying the traditional rhythm of the shopping year, extending seasonal sales far beyond their customary timeframes. Today, merchants are stretching these promotional periods longer, as, amid inflationary pressures and a cautious consumer base, shoppers concentrate their spending around these times. Retailers and marketplaces alike have been noting this trend in customer behavior.
“Customers remained very deal-focused and attracted to more predictable sales moments,” Best Buy CEO Corie Barry told analysts on the retailer’s most recent earnings call.
Similarly, in an interview with PYMNTS in April, Katie Stratton, chief growth officer at Target-owned on-demand delivery aggregator Shipt, observed this shift toward buying more during predictable sales events.
“In the past year, we’ve seen engagement in our promotions with higher-than-expected volume around popular seasonal moments,” Stratton said.
Against this backdrop, merchants are lengthening their events, making Black Friday Deals, for instance, last a whole week, or taking other popular sales holidays and stretching them past their traditional duration. The day after Memorial Day, for instance, NBC was still able to find nearly 90 holiday deals available. Extending these seasonal sales may help to maintain steady customer interest and spending over a longer period rather than concentrating all the promotional activity in a short burst.
This extension is made possible in large part by merchants’ increased ability to market effectively to consumers versus previous years. By leveraging data analytics and artificial intelligence (AI), retailers can tailor promotions to individual customer preferences throughout the drawn-out sales period, increasing likelihood of conversion and helping to maintain consumer engagement over a longer timeframe.
PYMNTS Intelligence data show that personalization, when done effectively, can go a long way toward driving engagement. Specifically, the study “Personalized Offers Are Powerful — But Too Often Off-Base,” created in collaboration with AWS, found that 83% of consumers are interested in receiving such personalized offers. However, the report revealed, only 44% of consumers say the offers they receive are very relevant to their needs.
Moreover, when these sales are extended ahead of time with early deals, such as Amazon is doing now, rather than prolonged after the fact, it can help to create a sense of urgency among consumers. This sense can encourage them to make purchases before the deals disappear. Additionally, these early deals may help build anticipation.
However, this strategy is not without its drawbacks. Consumers bombarded with constant promotions may become desensitized to them, ultimately eroding their value. Additionally, overextending the association of a brand with discounts can weaken its perceived quality and long-term value proposition.
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