4 Secrets to mastering the art of daily deals

So, you've decided to use "daily deals" as part of your Black Friday strategy for your Shopify store.

Great choice!

Running daily deals is a great way to create urgency, drive traffic, and increase sales, not only during Black Friday, but during the days leading up to the holiday weekend, and all throughout the year!

But first, you'll want to have a strategy for your daily deals. They need to be desirable without stealing all the thunder from the rest of your other Black Friday and Cyber Monday (BFCM) promotions.

To help, we’ve rounded up four secrets big retailers use to run killer daily deal promotions that will help you boost traffic and make more sales this BFCM.

PS - Scroll to the bottom of this blog for a quick a demo video that shows you how to set any of these deals up using Bold Discount!

1. Cycle between categories

Daily deals work best if you have enough products to offer something different every day. Ideally, you'll build up hype for your big Black Friday weekend deals with three-to-five days of smaller, but still enticing sales.

This will help keep your customers interested and coming back every day to see what kind of deal they can get. For example, if you sell apparel, you might want to offer a deal on hats one day, shirts the next, then socks another day.

But don't just vary the products, be sure to make different kinds of offers too. Instead of using a percentage discount every day, mix it up!

For example:

• Monday: All socks: $10
• Tuesday: All pants: buy one, get one 50% off
• Wednesday: All hats: 15% off
• Thursday: Free shipping ($0 minimum) all day

Once you've got your daily deals planned, Bold Discounts makes it easy to schedule your sales to start and end at a specific time.

2. Give your daily deals a fun theme

Black Friday should be a special, once-a-year shopping experience. Customers expect more than run-of-the-mill deals. Create promotions that people will want to share with their friends and family or post on their own social channels.

When coming up with daily deal ideas, try to think of a fun theme or story that will make customers rush to your store. Here are a few quick ideas:

• Holiday Happy Hour: 50% off until 5 p.m.
• Black Friday Week: A new deal every day
• Cyber Monday Madness: Check out today’s crazy deals!
• Black Friday Marathon: new deals every hour on the hour!

Come up with a theme that fits your brand and will get your customers excited. A different product bundle every day, a free branded tote bag, or a one-hour storewide sale to tease the big one you're having on the weekend.

Have fun, get creative, and your customers will reward you with conversions.

3. Start strong (and finish stronger!)

If you are running a series of daily deals, make sure you start with a bang! If you get people interested, chances are they will come back looking for more.

On the other hand, if your first offer isn’t that exciting, customers might not bother checking back in.

Let's say you sell chocolates. Here is one way you could structure a Black Friday week with daily deals leading up to the big weekend:

• Monday: Get two free pastries with any box of chocolates
• Tuesday: Truffle Tuesdays: all truffles $2 each (regular $3.99)
• Wednesday: 25% off all orders
• Thursday (Thanksgiving): Thanksgiving Stock-up: Buy one box, get one free

Don’t give away your best deals too early. You want your strongest offers to fall on Thanksgiving, Black Friday, and Cyber Monday when there is the most traffic.

4. Shout 'em out!

The biggest mistake you can make is assuming your customers will come looking for you. We aren't suggesting you email your deals out every hour on the hour (this will only result in customers hitting the "mark as spam" button), but there's nothing wrong with emailing customers once a day (heck, even twice a day!) to let them know about your amazing daily deals.

They're probably on your mailing list because they're waiting for discounts on their favorite products, and if they like the first one, they might be checking their inboxes for the next deal.

Making a lot of noise with your daily deals is a great way to cut past the competition and get customers invested in your Black Friday sale. This way, when you roll out your best deals on Black Friday and Cyber Monday, they will be more likely to visit your store first (instead of your competition!).

Also don't be afraid to promote your deals on social media. A well-placed and well-timed daily deal on Facebook or Instagram can create curiosity and a sense of urgency.

Have fun, get creative, and come up with an email strategy that will ensure your customers are looking at your daily deals first.

Bonus tip: cumulative deals

If you're running a series of daily deals leading up to Black Friday, it’s okay to keep them live all week — just don’t announce it up front!

If on Monday you have something like 10% off shirts, you can keep it going so that customers will be tempted to add more sale items to their cart. Just be careful how you promote it, because if shoppers catch on that your "daily" deals actually continue throughout the week, you risk losing that sense of urgency.

This is a great way to avoid deep discounts and have lots of offers running, while still creating a sense of urgency as each new deal rolls out.

Need help running a daily deals promotion this Black Friday?

Use the Bold Discounts app to easily schedule flash deals, storewide sales, and of course, daily deals!

Bold Discounts comes with a built-in countdown timer that allows you to promote your deals on your storefront.

It’s easy!

These plug-and play-apps from Bold are ready to superpower your Shopify store just in time for Black Friday Cyber Monday.