Free Shipping Messages Quite Popular on Twitter
Retailers know that consumers have come to anticipate and expect free shipping, especially during the holiday season. Therefore, they've taken to social media outlets such as Twitter and Facebook to promote their free shipping offers. And what better time to ramp up free shipping emails than the week leading up to Black Friday.
By analyzing digital marketing messages from more than 2,000 retailers from Oct. 17 through the week of Nov. 21 (the week of Black Friday), eDataSource, a provider of competitive intelligence for email, social media and e-commerce activity, found that the number of brands using "Free Shipping" messages increased 107 percent on Twitter, 63 percent on Facebook and 81 percent via email.
Twitter is the most popular platform for free shipping promotions, outnumbering email messages using "free shipping" in the subject line by 77 percent and outnumbering Facebook messages with free shipping by 279 percent. What's more, eDataSource found the number of tweets and retweets around free shipping to be unexpectedly high, proving that free shipping is one of consumers' most anticipated and favorite holiday promotions.
Other notable findings include the following:
Tweets containing "free shipping" consistently outnumbered emails with the same term in the subject line by 50 percent to 80 percent, depending on the week.
"Free shipping" emails increased week-over-week until the week of Black Friday, when they almost doubled (81 percent) from the week before.
All digital marketing messages with "free shipping," including on Facebook, peaked during the week of Black Friday.
"The fact that Twitter messaging around free shipping was so high shows how viral of a medium it can be," said G.B. Heidarsson, senior vice president of marketing for eDataSource, in a company press release. "While Facebook seems to have been underutilized in this regard, these social media channels should not be overlooked for promoting such a highly sought after deal."
What the FTC Fining FB $5B May Mean for Marketers
WWTT? IHOP's Mother's Day Tweet Was Tasteless