SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 12, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Salesforce (NYSE:
CRM), the global leader in CRM, today released its 2020 Holiday
Shopping Report, highlighting data and trends that shaped the
holiday season and will impact how consumers shop in 2021.
Salesforce data shows a 50 percent increase in digital spend over
the 2019 shopping season, making it one of the biggest digital
holiday shopping seasons to date. Consumers spent $1.1 trillion online worldwide and $236 billion in the U.S., compared to
$723 billion worldwide and
$165 billion in the U.S. in 2019.
Top Salesforce 2020 Holiday Shopping Insights
Salesforce combined insights from over one billion global
shoppers across more than 40 countries powered by Commerce Cloud
during the holiday season—between November 1 and December 31, 2020.
This season's top highlights and trends include:
- Digital commerce surged later in the year, despite an
earlier start to the holiday season: Although retailers
kicked off holiday discounts and promotions earlier in October, the
bulk of this year's digital sales were still generated during
traditional shopping holidays. Total Cyber Week digital sales
reached $270 billion globally and
$60 billion in the U.S., while the
first two weeks of December accounted for $181 billion in global sales and $39 billion in the U.S.
- Retailers offering curbside and other pickup options grew
almost twice as fast as those that didn't: With strained
shipping systems and consumers prioritizing safety, retailers with
curbside, drive-through and in-store pickup options outperformed
those without these services. U.S. retailers that offered these
options increased digital revenue by 49 percent on average
year-over-year, while retailers that didn't only saw 28 percent
average growth year-over-year. Retailers offering curbside,
drive-through and in-store pickup options also experienced 54
percent digital revenue growth year-over-year in the five days
leading up to Christmas, compared to 34 percent growth for those
that didn't.
- Consumers embraced financing options: With consumers
looking to pay for big ticket holiday gifts in installments, buy
now, pay later usage saw a year-over-year increase of 109 percent,
with the biggest increase taking place the week before
Christmas.
- Sporting Goods and Home Goods were the hottest product
categories: Revenue for Sporting Goods grew 108 percent
compared to the previous year, Home Goods grew 89 percent and Food
and Beverage kept pace with 80 percent growth. Active Apparel (35
percent), Footwear (39 percent) and General Apparel (40 percent)
experienced the least growth in revenue this holiday season.
- Retailers brace for "returnageddon": Over
$330 billion in online purchases are
expected to be returned globally—about 30 percent of all purchases
made—as a result of this holiday's ecommerce spike.
"The 2020 holiday season was defined by the pandemic and forced
retailers and brands to innovate quickly with the introduction of
services like curbside pickup, virtual concierges and a focus on
social, messaging and live streaming to reach shoppers in new
ways," said Rob Garf, VP, Industry
Strategy for Retail, Salesforce. "We expect to see these new
innovations remain in 2021 with holiday strategies becoming the new
standard that consumers expect from their favorite retailers and
brands."
Salesforce Powers the Holiday Season
As the pandemic forced shoppers out of stores and into the world
of ecommerce, Salesforce helped retailers around the world double
down on digital as they navigated new challenges, including scaling
their ecommerce operations. Between November
1 and December 31, 2020, Salesforce customers drove more
than 204 million online orders on Commerce Cloud, while delivering
fast, easy and personalized digital experiences to shoppers.
- Commerce Cloud: Digital sales powered by Commerce Cloud
grew 76 percent year-over-year this holiday season.
- Marketing Cloud: Global marketing communications made
through Marketing Cloud overall surged this holiday with 7.2
billion push notifications, 3.7 billion SMS messages and 129
billion total emails sent, as marketers engaged consistently
throughout the season.
- Einstein: Artificial intelligence continued to play
a role in how consumers shopped this holiday season. Einstein
accounted for 11 percent of digital orders, growing 25 percent
year-over-year.
- Service Cloud: Agents viewed or worked on cases more
than 14.5 billion times and received more than 946 million customer
service calls this holiday season through Service Cloud.
Additional Resources:
- Visit the Salesforce Holiday Insights Hub here
- Follow @Salesforce and @CommerceCloud on Twitter
- Like Salesforce on Facebook
2020 Salesforce Holiday Insights and Predictions
Methodology
To help retailers and brands benchmark holiday performance,
Salesforce combined data and holiday insights on the activity of
over one billion global shoppers across more than 40 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.
To qualify for inclusion in the analysis set, a digital commerce
site must have transacted throughout the analysis period, in this
case November 1, 2018 through
December 31, 2020, and meet a monthly
minimum visit threshold. Additional data hygiene factors are
applied to help ensure consistent metric calculation.
The Salesforce holiday predictions are not indicative of the
operational performance of Salesforce or its reported financial
metrics including GMV growth and comparable customer GMV
growth.
About Salesforce
Salesforce, the global CRM leader, empowers companies of every
size and industry to digitally transform and create a 360° view of
their customers. For more information about Salesforce (NYSE: CRM),
visit: www.salesforce.com.
Any unreleased services or features referenced in this or other
press releases or public statements are not currently available and
may not be delivered on time or at all. Customers who purchase
Salesforce applications should make their purchase decisions based
upon features that are currently available. Salesforce has
headquarters in San Francisco,
with offices in Europe and
Asia, and trades on the New York
Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol "CRM." For more information
please visit https://www.salesforce.com, or call
1-800-NO-SOFTWARE.
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SOURCE Salesforce