By: Arthur Cooper
Submitted: 2010-12-02 11:56:57 | Word Count: 664
If you thought that Cyber Mondays originated because online retailers offered drastic deals the Monday after Thanksgiving, think again. It didn’t start that way at all; rather it began with consumers—who liked to shop online from work. Normally, Mondays are good retail days for online businesses anyway, and typically, a Monday in December is usually when online retailers see their highest single day profit for the year, but it isn’t traditionally on “cyber Monday”.
It just happened to be that people tended to shop online on Mondays from work, both during the holiday season and …well, in general. Back in 2002, Shop.org noticed the habits of online consumers and coined the term in the interest of their own continued success. Since then, it has become part and parcel of the rush of the holiday shopping season. Now that over two-thirds of the American population have high speed internet at home, that trend of shopping at work has drastically reduced. People shop at home as well, but it’s still usually on Mondays.
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Despite the fact that Cyber Monday gets linked with Black Friday, it didn’t take off because of any drastic deals offered by online retailers. It was the perception of deals that propelled it. In fact, usually the products offered were those that didn’t sell on Black Friday. However Cyber Monday took off because of aggressive marketing campaigns by various online businesses who wanted to be a part of the buzz mostly conceived in consumer’s minds. Its fame eventually reached shoppers through word of mouth.
The trend has come full circle. Now that consumers expect to find a deal online on the Monday after Thanksgiving, retailers are beginning to offer them. The National Retail Federation, who owns Shop.org and the younger CyberMonday.com, says that this year, retailers offered the most sales to consumers since the trend began. In the online environment, there are few, in any, date specific sales. However, e-commerce sites have begun to take Cyber Monday more seriously in terms of how consumers actually think of it. They are now offering deals valid only on that date, despite the fact that it remains to be seen if it will in fact become the highest grossing day for the online environment.
The process of how Cyber Monday came onto being shows how important it is to relate to online shoppers in an organic way to ensure continued success. Online businesses, even more so than brick and mortar stores, need to be cognizant of how consumers think and of their actual surfing habits to stay competitive. A trend that began with consumers’ habits, which was dictated by their lifestyle and the availability of web access, mushroomed into a huge opportunity for e-commerce businesses to grow more profitable. By basically piggy-backing on the natural habits of online users, e-commerce sites may well be able to plan and depend on Cyber Monday for their profitability in the same way that brick and mortar stores prepare for and benefit from the hype surrounding Black Friday. As much as a third of the net profit of brick and mortar stores are garnered between Black Friday and the end of the holiday season.
In this tough economy, people are looking for deals more than ever. With finesse, e-commerce sites can cement the reputation of Cyber Monday as more than a marketing gimmick that leaves them holding the lemons that didn’t sell on Friday, but as a legitimate venue where users can go year after year to save money.
