If you’re on any popular social media platform, the chances are that you’ve already seen brands pushing products ahead of Black Friday. There’s really no escaping it, especially since shopping online for great Black Friday deals is growing in popularity, making it a genuine alternative to actually walking into a brick-and-mortar store. They times they are a-changin’.
Even though stores are using television, radio and web ads for pushing products ahead of Black Friday, you should probably take a look at their websites before you decide to wake up in the middle of the night to fight that guy for that toaster.
As many have pointed out over the past few years, there’s really no reason to go to a brick-and-mortar store — the deals are generally just as good online as they are in the store. And with many companies offering free shipping on orders of more than $100 (or even $50), shipping doesn’t even add that much to your bottom line.
Besides, getting out and fighting the crowd at Black Friday can be dangerous. No, really. Dangerous.
According to Advertising Age, Facebook and its photo-sharing app Instagram will let brands advertise directly to people who have recently posted something about or related to the holidays. What that means for this week is that if you’re adding #BlackFriday (or #CyberMonday) to your latest status updates or Instagram shares, it’s basically open season.
This marks a fairly drastic change in Facebook’s advertising, which normally only lets companies choose certain demographics for targeting customers.
Are you planning on getting out for Black Friday, or are you shopping online? Are you already seeing brands pushing products ahead of Black Friday on social media? Let us know in the comments below!
