Jason S. Bradshaw points out that most businesses run identical promotions during Black Friday and Cyber Monday, even unexpected ones like Domino's. Woolworths stood out with Orange Friday, a simple, low-cost alternative that worked. He's asking why you're copying everyone else.
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Hi everyone and welcome to Talking Points Live. This is Jason S. Bradshaw, and as a reminder, each fortnight my Talking Points with Jason newsletter is published. You can subscribe at Jason sbradshaw.com or on LinkedIn, whichever platform you would prefer. Now, of course, you can also reach out to me on all social networks at Jason S. Bradshaw, and if there's any way that I can help serve you and your audience, your customers, to help you have breakthrough success in your business. Today, I come to you more with a question than necessarily a hint or a tip. And the question is designed in a way to or my desire, I should say with the question, is that you will give some intentional thought behind what you're doing this time next year. So November 23rd is Thanksgiving Day in the USA and the subsequent that subsequently is followed by Black Friday sales and shortly after that, funny enough, Cyber Monday sales. And Australia and most parts of the world, of the developed world at least, have got on to this sales, sales, timing. And here in Australia there was a report released today that shows that Black Friday and Cyber Monday generates more revenue, more sales for many big retailers in Australia than Boxing Day does. If, you know, they go back 10 years and boxing Day was the day where loads of people would queue for hours to get those bargains, those limited bargains in big discount department stores, luxury department stores, your local shop. But the research is showing that that is significantly shifting and Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales are the place to be. And all day I've been getting SMS's emails, certainly more today than I have in the lead up to today, but I was getting early access to Black Friday sale emails. Two weeks ago I even had a pizza shop, Domino's sent me a text message saying, get their Black Friday deal. They have a deal every Friday. Why do they have to have a Black Friday deal? Anyway, my question to you is, how do you stand out when you're competing in exactly the same way as everyone else, not only in your industry, but in business in general? I've had offers from business coaches, mastermind groups. I'm not going to sign up to a mastermind group that needs to discount their product to get you to join that. It's just ridiculous. I've had, like I said, dominoes. I've had furniture stores, I've had electronics. I even had a Black Friday sale from my grocery store. Now, in fairness, that was Woolworths here in Australia and they're calling it the Orange Friday sale. And maybe orange is the new black after all. Look, my question to you just if you missed it the first time is how can you stand out and compete if you're just doing what everyone else does? So kudos to Woolworths for at least doing something different to try and own the event, to create an event within the event, if you like. The Orange Friday sale is a great play on words because, you know, we're all used to hearing Black Friday. That little bit of disruption, though, makes you take that second look, spend that extra 15 seconds, which could lead to more revenue than just being in a sea of sameness. But also, their rewards program is orange in color, so no, it did tie back into their branding. My point to you is that while I don't think Woolworths did anything necessarily exceptional, they did do this really well. They found a way to stand out without needing to spend a lot of time or money. And I would say breakthrough, because instead of everyone else sending, instead of being like everyone else sending a Black Friday email, they sent an Orange Friday email, which sparked curiosity, I guarantee you, and I'm not privy to their email open rates, but I guarantee you, based on what I know about marketing and the success that I've had and seen others had by sending an email with the Orange Friday sale, they would have sparked more curiosity and had greater open rates than a competitor in the same industry sending a Black Friday email. How can you expect to stand out if you do everything, if you compete, if you behave in the same way as your competitors? So today, instead of coming to you with a tip, I how to stand out, I'm going to ask you and encourage you to be curious around how you could stand out in the sea of sameness so that you build a brand that breaks through, that builds, like I like to say, business breakthrough success. I'm Jason S. Bradshaw. You can find me on all socials at Jason S. Bradshaw and my website, Jason sbradshaw.com if you're ready to break through in your marketplace, feel free to reach out to me and I'll see how I can help you achieve that. Have a great weekend and whatever you're doing, may it be fun and safe. Take care.
