Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday Sale 2017 Dates & Sale Ideas

We are about six weeks out from the kickoff to the holiday sales season Cutting for Business readers! If you are planning on cashing in on Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, or Cyber Monday – now is the time to start creating products, planning promotions, creating sales graphics, and scheduling them on social media and your email lists. Today, I’m giving you the dates (be sure to write them down!) and some sale ideas.

2017 Dates

• Black Friday is Friday, November 24th, 2017. It’s generally the kick off to the holiday shopping season.
• Small Business Saturday is Saturday, November 25th, 2017. This American Express created event highlights shopping with small businesses. You can pick up Small Business Saturday logos, register your store, and get more information about the day at this link.
• Cyber Monday is Monday, November 27th, 2017. Cyber Monday was created by marketers in 2005 as a way to lure shoppers to online retailers. Online retailers offer discounts on orders placed online.

Sale Ideas for Small Craft Business Owners

1. Offer a substantial discount in your store or offer substantial discounts on certain items in your store.
2. Advertise a free product with a minimum purchase of $XX. Examples of inexpensive products include decals (personalized or generic), keychains, earrings, headbands, Christmas ornaments, cupcake toppers, or greeting cards.
3. Give a gift certificate with a minimum purchase. This is a great way to encourage shoppers to return at a later time. Since many shoppers are buying gifts for the holidays, you can advertise a gift certificate to spend on themselves at a later date. Example: Free $15 gift certificate with $100 purchase.
4. Consider extending free shipping to customers. This approach is especially good for Cyber Monday shoppers who will be offered free shipping at most big box retailers.
5. Offer a “bounce back” offer when you ship your products. It is likely that you will get some new customers during your sale, so offer them a coupon code to shop in your store again.
6. Consider having timed promotions throughout the day or weekend. For example, from 8am to 12pm have a sale on one product, from 12pm to 4pm offer a different product on sale, and from 4pm to 8pm offer yet another product.
7. Host a giveaway for your sale. The easiest way to accomplish this is everyone who buys from you on a certain day will be automatically entered into your giveaway.
8. If possible, operate on a fast turnaround time. Holiday shoppers are often impatient and want their items quickly!

How to Advertise Your Sale

• Use your business’ social media. Offer your coupon codes to your social media followers. Tip: If you make coupon codes unique to each social media network, you can see which campaigns were most successful. Encourage your followers to share your posts and help spread the word.
• If you sell on Etsy, change your shop cover banner to a banner with information about your sale. While not officially used anymore, feel free to tag your products that are on sale with “Black Friday”, “Small Business Saturday”, and “Cyber Monday”.
• Use hashtags relevant to the event on social media. For example, #blackfriday #blackfridaysale #shopsmall #smallbizsat #cybermonday.

Don’t forget: If you want to schedule a sale for Etsy – they now have an easy to use built in tool that you can read about in this blog post.