Is Cyber Monday Effective?
RSR’s Rosenblum says a resounding “No!” She contends that if the industry jumped off the Cyber Monday bandwagon retailers would gain more total gross margin dollars. “Cyber Monday is a creation of the industry (or let’s say, industry trade groups), not the customer. The core assumption is that people shop while they are at work because they have bigger and better computers, and that’s just wrong, or at least dated. If retailers stopped running those silly promotions on that day…they would be primed to provide a better customer experience.” Nevertheless, Cyber Monday exists and will likely continue to exist. To make it a successful event, retailers must first ensure that their web sites will work effectively throughout the entire Thanksgiving weekend, then they should focus on effective cross-channel retailing as an everyday practice. “Retailers have totally underestimated the amount of online traffic on Black Friday,” says Buzek. “Sears’ site went down and Walmart attempted a major cha
