The winners of Black Friday

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Black Friday came and went.

I hope you got some sleep in between refreshing those Shopify dashboards.

Overall, I saw a lot of people up and winning.

But that is not the whole story this year.

Coming into this year, it felt like every brand was holding their breath to see what would happen in Q4.

We have had pockets of softness in the consumer all year long across different verticals.

After Black Friday, I saw more brands than usual experience flat year over year or even a decline.

Unfortunately, online, you will have people talking about averages which doesn’t tell the full story. You might have a few massive winners pulling up a lot of losers.

The winners though executed on two things really well.

1. Product development

The winners understood they couldn’t coast on their core products alone. New products create natural peaks of interest throughout the year.

Even with consumer softness in the year, the product launches created a peak of demand in times that were lower than usual.

When you have multiple products, you automatically expand your customer acquisition base and audience. You can play with different price points, which helps optimize both average order value and customer acquisition costs.

Each new product launch gives you fresh angles for your ad creative. You're not stuck telling the same story over and over. Plus, having more products means your existing customers have new reasons to come back and buy again.

The brands that struggled this year were often the ones who spent 2024 chasing new customers for the same products. Without product development, they were essentially running the same race over but in a more difficult environment, hoping for different results.

Peep that timestamp… January 25, 2024.

I was on to something at the beginning of the year, and I think it played an important role this year.

2. Ad creative and funnel development

This wasn't about who could spend the most money. It was about who could spend the smartest. The winners spent January through November testing everything.

They took the time to go deep on what messaging resonated with different audiences.

Not only that, they refined their landing pages and optimized their entire funnels.

These brands knew their exact customer acquisition funnels before Black Friday even started. They weren't guessing or hoping - they had hard data backing every decision.

Here's what made this year particularly interesting: These two factors amplified each other perfectly. New products gave these brands fresh angles for acquisition. Their detailed acquisition data helped them launch new products more effectively. It created a virtuous cycle that kept building momentum all year.

3. The takeaways

The real lesson here is that Black Friday success isn't built in November.

It's built in February, when you're planning that summer product launch.

It's built in April, when you're testing new ad angles.

It's built in July, when you're optimizing your funnel.

For 2025, we need to start asking ourselves some tough questions now. What new products are in our pipeline? When are they launching? What creative assets do we need to have ready? How can we test and optimize everything before Q4 hits?

I know people believe Q4 is important but there is a scramble to get things done at the end of the year.

With our clients, I want to frame the decision making and conversations to: How will this impact us in Q4?

I don’t want to come off as negative, because net net, I saw a lot of big wins which I am happy about.

I do think this year is the first year in a while that was harder for more brands.

I am excited for the new year and what is to come.

I will see you next week.

Until then, keep creating!

Matthew Gattozzi

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