Online and digital advertising play a bigger role this year.
Adroit Digital has released a study on how U.S. consumers plan to shop for Valentine’s Day, including when they plan to shop, how they plan to shop, and what they plan to buy.
In fact, consumers have a willingness to respond to peronsalized ads in early February.
The study revealed the heightened role online and digital advertising might play in a consumer’s shopping journey during the two weeks before Valentine’s Day this year. A critical time for brand advertisers and marketers to catch the eye of loving consumers annually, U.S. consumers spent close to $19 billion on Valentine’s Day goods in 2013, according to the National Retail Federation (NRF).
Highlights:
Skipping the Store: More than half of all survey respondents (59%) indicated a preference to purchase their Valentine’s Day gifts online this year, including using smartphones and tablets, as opposed to in an actual retail store location.
Prime Time for Purchases: 48% of consumers in the survey plan to make their Valentine’s Day gift purchases the first week of February, though women and men appear to have inverse shopping intentions. Some 47% of men think they’ll make their purchases the first week of February, compared with 27% of women. These figures flip the second week of February, with 25% of men planning to make purchases compared with 48% of women.
Win Hearts and Wallets: The majority of consumers in the survey, 58%, indicated online ads, including tablet and mobile ads, will influence their Valentine’s Day purchase decision.
Catch Them While You Can: 59% percent of survey respondents indicated that they think they’ll only visit one to three retail sites before making a purchase decision.
Seal the Deal: 36% of shoppers in the survey said they were 50+% more likely to respond to a personalized ad than a generic ad.
Drive Them to the Final Purchase: When shoppers are making their online purchase selections for Valentine’s Day this year, they’ll be looking for a few key offers. Some 64% would seek another site if free shipping wasn’t offered, and 48% would move on if they didn’t see Valentine’s Day specials.