It’s the end of May… and we’re already talking about Black Friday?

Yes, we are. Because the biggest, most common mistake with BFCM campaigns is leaving your prep too late.

In May, BFCM seems like a lifetime away.

Then when it hits, you’re thinking “I wish we had a bigger email list. I wish we had a warm list. I wish we had more data on what kind of promotions work best with our customers.”

That’s the kind of thing you can’t get with a sprint in October/November. It’s built 6+ months ahead of time.

And if you do the work, you’ll have a competitive advantage come Thanksgiving.

Don’t wait for the webinars and reports that come out at the start of October, telling you how to “win” BFCM.

By then it’s too late. All the things that matter are in motion, or too late to build.

People think that a successful BFCM is about strategy and execution. But really the biggest difference maker is the assets you have to work with.

A brand with a huge email list, an app with tens of thousands of active users, and data from running, testing and analyzing numerous promos over the last 12 months is at a competitive advantage.

The “perfect” execution on your BFCM promo - Halpert-level copywriting, video ads directed by James Cameron, and a 100% off discount - still won’t beat a large, engaged customer list, and running a smart but simple campaign built for the long run.

That’s what you’ve got to set up now, not in 3-4 months, when the hype is at its peak.

So let’s dive into it - five tips to start thinking about now, about how you’re going to make BFCM 2026 a key inflection point for your business.

The biggest advantage for any brand for BFCM - or any other major sales event - is a large, engaged list of customers they can contact directly.

Getting through is harder during BFCM. Social feeds are crammed and ads cost multiple times more (and your margins are already getting slaughtered before this).

You need channels where you own the delivery - email, SMS, a mobile app.

Owned channels are valuable every day of the year. But when it costs a premium to reach people, the value is multiplied 10x.

Here’s the major mistake, or omission, or whatever you want to call it, that brands make with BFCM prep.

They have the channels - a big email/SMS list, an app with users. But they’re not actively using them.

If you’ve ever bought anything online, you’ll know from experience that most of the brands out there are quiet throughout the year, then only wake up when it’s time to sell you something.

You tune these brands out - especially when you have 50 emails all saying “Our biggest sale of the year is live!”

It’s so, so important that you condition your customers to noticing and opening your messages.

You need to be using these channels regularly, for months leading up to BFCM. Not just starting in November.

Getting into the strategic part. The key question to ask when deciding on your BFCM promo strategy is: will this benefit us long-term?

The impulse is to optimize for the biggest BFCM weekend possible. You want to break all the sales records. Do more revenue in a single Friday-Monday period than any brand has ever done in the history of commerce.

But often, focusing exclusively on short-term results means sacrificing long-term gains.

Not that a huge BFCM weekend is necessarily a bad thing. Just ask yourself: are we acquiring customers that are likely to stick around?

Are we building loyalty from our existing customers, who’ll respond by spending more with us in the future?

This is what your BFCM should be about. Building momentum that continues on into the new year and beyond.

Don’t just plan your promo flows now. Plan your follow-ups as well.

This carries on from the previous point. Your goal should be to use BFCM as a launchpad, and keep momentum going after the weekend is over.

Part of keeping momentum going is your strategy for newly acquired customers over BFCM.

It’s especially important for BFCM sales, because these people likely bought from 10 different brands over the weekend, so it’s much easier for one brand to be forgotten.

Your BFCM planning also needs to include:

Think: how are we going to get these people to their second purchase - one that doesn’t come at a 50% discount?

The numbers you get to this milestone is the real success metric for your BFCM.

You can plan all you want; but the only way to know what truly works or doesn’t work is to try it and let your customers tell you (with their wallets).

There are plenty of opportunities to run promos throughout the year. Use some lower-stakes events as dress rehearsals for the big dance.

Test different kinds of promotions:

Also test creative, messaging, timing, segmentation, CRO; all the good stuff that you want to get right before BFCM.

Don’t rely on what Claude tells you is going to work. Find out for yourself.

If you’re adding anything new to your site or channel stack, launch it early.

That could be:

Whatever it is, don’t get caught hoping everything works during BFCM.

Give time for any kinks or bugs to be ironed out and fixed well before.

I’ve been working in software a long time; and the one constant is that implementations usually take longer than you expect.

You don’t want to worry about things holding up during BFCM, or being ready in time.

Plan as if BFCM is happening in October. All your systems should be ready and firing by then.

One of the most powerful brands assets you can have during the holiday season is a mobile app.

It gives you a direct line to your best customers - a way to skip over the noise in other channels, and a way to keep the connection going once BFCM is over.

If you’ve been thinking about launching an app, now is the best time. While there’s still time to launch and grow pre-BFCM.

MobiLoud is the best way for established brands to launch custom mobile apps. The apps are built on the same tech as your site, easy to manage, with none of the overhead of managing a separate channel.

If you’re doing $5M+ in annual revenue and want to explore how you can go live with your own app in 6-8 weeks, go to our site to book a call, or drop me a DM on LinkedIn.

Shopify: AI-referred shoppers convert 50% better and spend 14% more

Shopify's own data on AI-referred sessions in Q1 2026: nearly 50% higher conversion rate than organic search, 14% higher AOV, and 13x YoY growth. More than half of AI-referred sessions start on a product detail page vs 20% for organic. These buyers arrive having already done the research inside the AI conversation, ready to buy.

Walmart's Sparky AI agent drives 35% higher AOV

On Walmart's Q1 earnings call, CEO John Furner said customers using its Sparky shopping agent have AOVs about 35% higher than non-users. Weekly active users on Sparky are up over 100% in the last quarter, and units purchased through the agent have more than quadrupled vs the prior quarter. Walmart's ad revenue grew 37% globally in Q1.

Consumers let AI shortlist, but trust still gates the purchase

A PSE Consulting survey of 4,200+ shoppers across the US, UK, France and Germany found that more than 9 in 10 still check brand recognition and customer reviews before buying via AI-assisted shopping. Only 13% trust AI to actually make a purchase for them, vs 36% who trust it to influence the decision. AI-referred shoppers also abandon at 2x the rate of organic traffic when they hit friction.

Google introduces Gemini Spark, a proactive AI assistant

At Google I/O 2026 on May 19, Google announced Gemini Spark, an AI assistant that proactively performs tasks for users rather than waiting to be asked. The keynote also covered AI advances across Search and Gemini more broadly. The shift from "AI answers" to "AI does" is now official platform direction.

TikTok Shop is now the #6 US health and beauty platform

Per Nielsen IQ data, TikTok Shop is doing $2.5B to $4.4B in US health and beauty GMV with 30,000 active brands and 84% YoY growth, the fastest of any beauty channel. 30% of TTS beauty buyers hadn't purchased online anywhere else in the prior year, so it's expanding the category, not just stealing share. Micro-creators under 20k followers are outperforming big names because the algorithm rewards completion rate and rewatches over reach.

Shopify adds native SMS automations for cart, checkout, and browse abandonment

Released May 19, Shopify Messaging now ships native SMS automations with pre-built templates for abandoned cart, abandoned checkout, and browse abandonment, plus custom flows. Replies route to the same Messaging inbox as inbound chat. Worth knowing about if you're working through tip 1 above: it's one less third-party app between you and the channel you own.

That's all for today.

The main takeaway: your success during BFCM comes from what you do in the 6+ months before.

Building assets, testing promo strategies, putting a long-term plan in place.

This kind of stuff compounds.

Do what compounds now - and for BFCM, focus on things that will compound after BFCM ends.

That’s the recipe for a “winning” Black Friday.

Until next time,

Pietro and The Retention Edge Team

PS: shoot me a DM on LinkedIn if you’re interested in what a custom mobile app could do for your brand.