Kicking off the Holiday Season: Walmart.com’s Sizzling Black Friday
Written by Gregg Poulin (contact - e-mail) -- December 11th, 2008 | Share - Save - E-mailWhere were you on Black Friday? If you were online, there is a pretty decent chance that you were looking for a sweet deal or two, and where better to find a deal than walmart.com? Well, you weren’t alone. Nearly 7% of all U.S. Internet users on Black Friday visited walmart.com, almost seven times the site’s average reach on any given day in 2008. But what was behind this remarkable spike? Using Compete Pro Analytics, we took a closer look at Walmart’s strategy to identify a few ways in which walmart.com blew away the competition.
Step 1: Using Compete Site Analytics, we ran a Daily Reach report for walmart.com. The graph below highlights our findings: walmart.com’s Black Friday Reach equaled that of amazon.com’s – nearly7% of all people online that day!
Step 2: Next, using Compete Referral Analyics, we drilled down to examine some of the sources of Walmart’s online traffic. One clear alliance that walmart.com forged was with key Black Friday specific sites. As you can see in the data below, walmart.com captured nearly twice the referral traffic share from the top ten Black Friday websites as the next closest competitor.
Step 3: Using Compete Ranked Lists, we ran a report on the top 15,000 Compete ranked sites in November, sorted that list by growth and examined the top ten Black Friday sites. On average, traffic to these sites grew by 1600% over the previous month, confirming that Walmart’s strategy of leveraging Black Friday site traffic lift was a good one.
Step 4: Finally, we honed in on Search data with Compete Search Analytics to see if Walmart’s multichannel media blitz was coupled with Search marketing. Using the Keyword Destination report, we ran a Broad Match for the term “Black Friday”, and sure enough, walmart.com was the top retailer site getting traffic from the keyword.
A carefully crafted and well-executed traffic acquisition strategy resulted in walmart.com kicking off the holiday shopping season with a bang.
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December 11th, 2008 at 11:27 pm
I would imagine that people were also visiting walmart.com because there was that awful Black Friday-related tragedy at one of their stores.
December 12th, 2008 at 2:12 am
Yeah, that was at the Green Acres Mall in Valley Stream, Nassau County, NY. Poor guy was trampled to death at the Wal-mart there. Apparently, there were more than 2000 shoppers pushing to get in and they broke the door down. You know what they should do? Offer holiday shopping discounts only on the website, and not in-person. That’ll put a quick end to this kind of animal behavior.
December 12th, 2008 at 11:31 am
Plus this economy is so interesting to people who have never been interested in economy and finance are finding themselves very curious.
December 18th, 2008 at 10:47 am
FYI – Walmart’s search marketing agency is SMG Search, based in Chicago and NYC.
January 25th, 2009 at 2:30 pm
Very well analysed. You have presented a beautiful case of Walmart’s research and strategy.
Brian.
April 13th, 2009 at 1:52 pm
nice job
April 14th, 2009 at 12:33 pm
very nice article
May 9th, 2009 at 1:51 am
Nice analytical tool you got there. Walmart.com and Amazon.com are the best place to search for Black Friday deals.
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January 17th, 2010 at 1:35 am
I’m not a fan of waiting in line or the hustle and bustle of holiday shopping in stores. I love having gifts for my friends and family delivered right to my door. There’s nothing like curling up on the couch with your laptop do online shopping.
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