• Digital sales grew around 58 percent during the five days leading up to Christmas, despite earlier shipping cutoffs 
  • $330 billion in online purchases are expected to be returned globally—about 30 percent of all purchases made

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates:—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: Service Cloud: Agents viewed or worked on cases more than 5 billion times and received more than 946 million customer service calls this holiday season through Service Cloud.

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.

-Ends-

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.

Media Contacts:
Michelle Oribello
Wallis
salesforce@wallispr.com 

Send us your press releases to pressrelease.zawya@refinitiv.com

© Press Release 2021

Disclaimer: The contents of this press release was provided from an external third party provider. This website is not responsible for, and does not control, such external content. This content is provided on an “as is” and “as available” basis and has not been edited in any way. Neither this website nor our affiliates guarantee the accuracy of or endorse the views or opinions expressed in this press release.

The press release is provided for informational purposes only. The content does not provide tax, legal or investment advice or opinion regarding the suitability, value or profitability of any particular security, portfolio or investment strategy. Neither this website nor our affiliates shall be liable for any errors or inaccuracies in the content, or for any actions taken by you in reliance thereon. You expressly agree that your use of the information within this article is at your sole risk.

To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, this website, its parent company, its subsidiaries, its affiliates and the respective shareholders, directors, officers, employees, agents, advertisers, content providers and licensors will not be liable (jointly or severally) to you for any direct, indirect, consequential, special, incidental, punitive or exemplary damages, including without limitation, lost profits, lost savings and lost revenues, whether in negligence, tort, contract or any other theory of liability, even if the parties have been advised of the possibility or could have foreseen any such damages.