2019 Black Friday and Christmas shopping predictions

AppAnnie have forecast their 2019 Black Friday and Christmas shopping predictions, based on their unrivalled data and insights into mobile usage and trends.

As the retail industry faces a shortened Black Friday and Christmas shopping season and rapid digital disruption, mobile is set to play its biggest role yet. This year, the National Retail Federation predicts online sales will grow 11-14%, and a recent survey from Deloitte shows that 70% of smartphone users are planning to make purchases from their mobile devices this year. This season, mobile will prove to be an influential differentiator for helping retailers to streamline customer journeys and accelerate transactions. To help guide retailers’ mobile strategies this holiday season, we’ve pulled together the 3 key trends you should know.

In EMEA, hours spent on shopping apps on Android are set to increase, year on year, in the four week period beginning with the week of Black Friday:

• UK: nearly 35 million hours (20% growth yoy)
• France: nearly 50 million hours (40% growth yoy)
• Germany: nearly 75 million hours (20% growth yoy)

AppAnnie’s top three international predictions are:

• Mobile Set to Drive Growth to Record $37B in Singles Day Sales
• 2.2 Billion Hours to Be Spent in Shopping Apps Across Weeks of Black Friday, Cyber Monday and the Two Weeks After
• Digital-First Retailers Will Win With Gen Z This Holiday Season

The average consumer spends three hours daily on their smartphone device — making this a key consumer touchpoint. As we near the weeks leading into the biggest holiday shopping days of the year — Black Friday and Cyber Monday — it’s important that retailers focus efforts on preparing their mobile channels for this influx in activity to ensure the most seamless and personalised experiences for their shoppers, especially for the mobile-native shoppers in Gen Z.