Adobe predicts over $140 billion in revenue this holiday season

The end of October usually marks two very different things.

First, tons of leftover Halloween candy that needs to be consumed.

Second, and more importantly, it’s the beginning of the holiday buying season. 

This time each year, Adobe releases its annual Holiday Shopping Predictions Report — and this year is no different, except for the fact that the holiday season is shorter than normal due to Thanksgiving being unusually late.

Adobe’s report predicts over $140 billion in revenue for the 2019 holiday season, a year over year (YoY) increase of roughly 14.1% — even with the shorter selling period.

“Holiday 2019 is the shortest possible, with only 22 days between Cyber Monday and Christmas,” says Adobe. “This leaves almost $1 billion in revenue behind. However, retailers are able to make that up by starting sales earlier this year. Thanksgiving [sales] will grow at 20%, contributing 0.7B more revenue than in 2018.”

That’s a ton of revenue left on the table, even with a large amount of growth expected. The report goes further predicting a major increase for Cyber Monday. 

Adobe goes as far as to predict an 18.9% increase over 2018, making Cyber Monday the first $9 billion day in the history of e-commerce revenue.

It’s going to be a big year for Holiday sales, folks! 

What it means for you

If you haven’t already started planning your holiday campaigns, including organic and paid media, now is the time to get moving.

Adobe dubs this period the “Most wonderful time of the year for advertisers,” with expected increases to cost per impression (CPM) of up to 23%. The increase in CPM is usually due to the increase in users actually shopping online for gifts. More eyes mean more impressions, which leads to an increased cost.

The report did state that 52% of consumers felt that Holiday or “seasonal” ads are more appealing, which yields a roughly 30% increase in completion rates during the season — meaning you should be getting more bang for your buck on your ad spend during the holidays. 

So, make sure you’re planning your paid ad campaigns to be the most contextual and straight forward they can be — and you’re likely to reap the rewards of your effort. Identify the best deals that you’ve run historically for Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and the Holidays in general, and update them for your current initiatives and deals.

Then, you’ll want to ensure that your ad copy and designs resonate.  A great way to do this is to ask a few of your current happy customers. After all, you want more of them. 

With the right strategy, you too can capitalize on Adobe’s predicted revenue growth this year. I know I’m ready for some amazing deals :) 

If you’re looking to get your Holiday campaigns set up for success, either for Paid Media or organically — let us know; our team is always happy to help.