Salesforce Reveals Record-Breaking $31 Billion in U.S. Cyber Week Digital Sales--Shattering Records Amid a Shorter Holiday Season

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 3, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Salesforce (NYSE: CRM), the global leader in CRM, today released its Cyber Week insights, unveiling a record $31 billion in U.S. Cyber Week digital commerce revenue, up 15 percent from 2018. Despite a shorter holiday shopping season, retailers leveraged advances in artificial intelligence (AI), mobile and social to get shoppers to start early.

Top Salesforce 2019 Holiday Shopping Insights

    --  Brands push consumers to start holiday shopping early: With a later
        Thanksgiving and shortened holiday selling season, retailers made every
        day count, pushing out discounts and promotions earlier than ever. The
        average discount rate started at 23 percent on November 25th and grew
        steadily throughout the week, ending with a 30 percent average discount
        rate on Cyber Monday. Marketers kept the steady drumbeat of engagement
        to promote their best deals leading into the weekend with the number of
        emails sent on Black Friday up 17 percent from Thanksgiving Day. Text
        messaging also grew on Black Friday, up 22 percent from Thanksgiving.
    --  AI eliminates guesswork for shoppers: AI-powered search and product
        recommendations gave shoppers exactly what they were looking for--when
        and where they were looking for it. In fact, up to 9 percent of digital
        orders during Cyber Week were a result of AI-powered product
        recommendations. Shoppers that purchased products from AI-powered
        recommendations bought 12 percent more units per transaction across
        Thanksgiving and Black Friday compared to peers who did not purchase
        from AI-powered recommendations.
    --  Mobile is the MVP of Cyber Week: A whopping 73 percent of global digital
        traffic came from mobile devices (up from 66 percent in 2018), marking
        for yet another groundbreaking year for mobile. However, global mobile
        orders were the real breakout star, as buying reached 55 percent (up
        from 50 percent in 2018), driving the most digital traffic and orders of
        any device. In addition to spikes in mobile usage, social buying through
        mobile also hit an all-time high--growing 41 percent since 2018 and
        making up 7 percent of mobile orders on the Wednesday before
        Thanksgiving, a peak day.
    --  Consumers come out early to research, but save purchases for Cyber Week:
        Early marketing activity was successful in generating buzz ahead of
        Cyber Week. During Pre-Cyber Week (November 19 - November 25), digital
        traffic was up 13 percent from 2018. Shoppers filled their online
        baskets, but held out for bigger deals in the week ahead. The strategy
        paid off, with digital orders growing to 18 percent during Cyber Week
        this year.
    --  Retailers with click and collect will win later in the season: Ecommerce
        sites offering in-store order pickup will see big gains late in the
        season, as shoppers scramble to complete their last minute holiday
        purchases. Retailers offering this capability on their e-commerce sites
        will see 48 percent more active digital shoppers and collect 28 percent
        more digital revenue share in the last five days leading up to
        Christmas.

Salesforce Powers the Holiday Season
Salesforce delivers massive scale in business to consumer (B2C) CRM throughout the year, but especially during the peak holiday season. This year, Salesforce helped retailers globally power personalized commerce, marketing and customer service experiences throughout Cyber Week:

    --  Commerce Cloud global customers saw 15 percent digital revenue growth on
        Cyber Monday and 16 percent digital revenue growth on Black Friday. From
        Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday, Commerce Cloud powered digital sales
        were up 13 percent year-over-year.
    --  Marketing Cloud emails sends grew 20 percent on Black Friday and 13
        percent on Thanksgiving as marketers engaged early and consistently
        throughout Cyber Week. SMS was again the breakout star as SMS sends grew
        133 percent across Thanksgiving and Black Friday over the same period in
        2018.
    --  Service Cloud agents interacted with 3 percent more cases on Black
        Friday compared to Thanksgiving as shopping activity picked up before
        Cyber Weekend. Shoppers were more likely to ring up service centers on
        Black Friday too, with calls to service centers growing 19 percent
        between Thanksgiving and Black Friday.

Comments on the News

    --  "With a shorter holiday season, the pressure was on brands and retailers
        this Cyber Week," said Rob Garf, VP of Strategy and Insights for Retail
        and Consumer Goods, Salesforce. "Driven by savvy shoppers looking for
        convenience, personalization and speed before the holiday shopping
        window closes--winners broke down the friction between inspiration and
        purchase with artificial intelligence, click and collect and improved
        mobile usability."

Additional Resources:

    --  Visit the Salesforce Holiday Insights Hub
    --  Read the Salesforce Black Friday Flash Report
    --  Read the Salesforce Thanksgiving Flash Report
    --  Like Salesforce on Facebook
    --  Follow @salesforce on Twitter

2019 Salesforce Holiday Insights and Predictions Methodology
To help retailers and brands benchmark holiday performance, Salesforce combined data and holiday insights on the activity of more than half a billion global shoppers across more than 30 countries powered by Commerce Cloud, billions of consumer engagements and millions of public social media conversations through Marketing Cloud, and customer service data powered by Service Cloud. Several factors are subsequently applied to extrapolate projections and actuals for the broader retail industry. These holiday flash reports are a derivative of the quarterly Shopping Index.

About Salesforce
Salesforce is the global leader in Customer Relationship Management (CRM), bringing companies closer to their customers in the digital age. Founded in 1999, Salesforce enables companies of every size and industry to take advantage of powerful technologies--cloud, mobile, social, internet of things, artificial intelligence, voice and blockchain--to create a 360° view of their customers. For more information about Salesforce (NYSE: CRM), visit: www.salesforce.com.

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SOURCE Salesforce