• Influencers and other affiliates drove about 20% of US Cyber Monday revenue, per Adobe Analytics.
• Posts with affiliate links were six times as likely to lead to a sale as other social content was.
• Social shopping has been on the rise in the US, as platforms like TikTok lean into e-commerce.

Influencers are helping to boost sales this holiday season — and getting paid to do so.

Social-media influencers and other content makers that recommend products via affiliate links helped drive about 20% of US e-commerce revenue on Cyber Monday, according to new data from Adobe Analytics. That's a roughly 7% year-over-year increase from 2023, the company said.

Affiliate linking is a marketing strategy where a figure of influence, such as a TikTok star or a product-review writer at Wirecutter, shares an item and earns a commission if someone buys it via a referral link.

Adobe Analytics found that products promoted via an affiliate link were six times as likely to lead to a purchase compared to content posted on social media by a brand or user that did not contain an affiliate-marketing or comparable promotional link.

This suggests that professional product endorsers are more effective at driving sales than other social-media users, Taylor Schreiner, a senior director at Adobe Digital Insights, told Business Insider.

"We're bombarded with information from all sorts of different channels, and people are finding that a recommendation from another brand they trust, be it an individual or a broader one, is of a lot of value to them in this attention-sapped environment," Schreiner said.

Affiliate marketing has become an increasingly important tactic for driving e-commerce sales as more consumers, and young shoppers in particular, turn to bloggers and other digital creators to decide what to buy. Fifty-two percent of 18- to 29-year-olds said their purchase decisions were influenced by social-media creators either somewhat or very often, per a YouGov survey conducted in December 2023.

Companies like Amazon, Walmart, and LTK have spent years building affiliate programs to compensate creators who drive sales.

LTK cofounder and president Amber Venz Box told BI that the company's creator partners were "able to earn a commission on pretty much every product that they're talking about, featuring, and using in their own lives." LTK said its creators drive billions in retail sales annually.

Social shopping has generally been on the rise this year, as platforms like TikTok introduce more robust e-commerce features, including live shopping. TikTok Shop drove over $100 million in single-day sales on Black Friday, a company spokesperson said.

Overall, consumers spent a total of $13.3 billion on e-commerce in the US on Cyber Monday, a 7.3% increase from the previous year, Adobe Analytics reported. Online spend for the five-day period between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday reached  $41.1 billion. For its estimates, Adobe said it analyzes commerce transactions online across over 1 trillion visits to US retail sites and 100 million unique products, or SKUs.

• It's official: This Cyber Monday was the biggest online-shopping day ever.
• Deep discounts encouraged US shoppers to spend more on electronics, apparel, and luxury goods.
• The day capped off a big week of spending, signaling a strong start to retail's holiday season.

Cyber Monday was officially the biggest online-shopping day ever, according to fresh data from Adobe and Salesforce.

Depending on which you ask, US shoppers spent $13.3 billion (per Adobe) or $12.8 billion (per Salesforce) on Monday alone. In both cases, this year's number was up by a low-single-digit percentage from last year's marquee digital-sales day, which set the previous online-shopping record.

"It is a top discounting day," Salesforce's director of consumer insights, Caila Schwartz, told Business Insider. "It was one of the better days for online discounting compared to the rest of the week."

Deep markdowns in categories like electronics (30% off on average, tracked by Adobe) or apparel (39% off on average, tracked by Salesforce) encouraged inflation-pressured shoppers to spend more.

Meanwhile, others splurged on luxury goods and other big-ticket items that they'd been saving for since earlier year and planning to purchase during this holiday event, Schwartz said, citing customer surveys.

Taken together, the focus on deals and more carefully planned purchases suggest a shopper still stressed by high prices but nevertheless willing to spend during key moments — a profile that echoes recent remarks from major retailers' earnings calls.

The average order value on Cyber Monday rang in at $124 per transaction and included 3.5 items, Salesforce found.

As expected, shoppers increasingly used their phones to find and buy items, with more than three-quarters of website visits coming from mobile devices, Salesforce said. Mobile sales accounted for more than half of the Cyber Monday total, Adobe found.

"We're seeing that the consumer is getting a lot more comfortable not only doing research and browsing from their phones but also transacting from their phones for those bigger ticket items," Salesforce's Schwartz said.

"With those larger purchases — luxury electronics, even furniture and appliances — the mobile experience is getting a lot better, more intuitive," she added.

Online shoppers were also busier than usual in the days leading up to Monday — now called Cyber Week — with Thanksgiving and Black Friday seeing considerable sales growth over last year.

"Early discounts were strong enough that many consumers felt comfortable hitting the buy button earlier during Cyber Week, with Cyber Monday becoming 'last call' for shoppers to take advantage of big holiday deals," Adobe Digital Insights' lead analyst, Vivek Pandya, said in a statement.

The biggest discounts appear to be over, but some markdowns remain, and the sales so far signal a strong start to retail's holiday season.

Adobe expects total US holiday sales this year to top $240 billion, up 8.4% from last year. Salesforce's forecasts are closer to 8% growth for the period.

"We're still on track for another record-breaking digital holiday season," Schwartz said.

• Thanksgiving online spending hit $6.1 billion, driven in part by mobile device purchases.
• More shoppers are using buy now, pay later, with $993 million in sales using the method expected Cyber Monday.
• About 80% of those purchases were made on a phone.

This year, more shoppers than ever are using buy now, pay later options that let buyers pay for purchases in installments — and more often than not from their cell phones.

According to new data from Adobe, buy now, pay later accounted for $6.9 billion in holiday spending from November 1 to November 28, with nearly 80% of purchases made on mobile devices.

On Black Friday, buy now, pay later is expected to rack up $711.3 million in sales by midnight — a 12.8% increase year over year. And come Cyber Monday, Adobe forecasts a record-breaking single day of buy now, pay later spending — $993 million.

Overall, shoppers are spending more than ever this Thanksgiving, with $6.1 billion spent online, according to Adobe. And roughly 60% of online consumers placed orders from their mobile devices.

"Cyber Week is off to a strong start, where bigger-than-expected discounts on Thanksgiving propelled impulse shopping in categories like electronics and apparel," Vivek Pandya, lead analyst at Adobe Digital Insights, said in a statement. "As people gathered with family and friends, many were hitting the buy button on their mobile devices, which hit an all-time high for the overall holiday season."

Buy now, pay later is available in many online stores via partnerships with companies like Affirm, Afterpay, and Klarna. They allow customers to pay a percentage of the total upfront and typically make interest-free payments over a set time.

A recent Harvard Business Review report found that buy now, pay later consumers spent an average of 10% more per purchase than they did without the option. And more often than not, those overspending were "financially constrained" credit-card-reliant consumers, according to the report.

BNPL has not been largely regulated, and the study warns that if consumers continue to spend more than they can afford on buy now, pay later purchases, they could accrue more debt.

• Adobe reports record $7.9 billion in online spending on Black Friday so far, up 8.2% from 2023.
• Adobe expects final online Black Friday numbers to be between $10.7 and $11 billion.
• Inflation and high credit card debt make consumers cautious, yet spending remains resilient.

Americans continued to spend on Black Friday after strong Thanksgiving sales numbers, even despite inflation concerns.

Adobe's initial Black Friday e-commerce data reveals consumers spent $7.9 billion online this Black Friday through 6:30 p.m. This total is up 8.2% compared to last year's value.

With spending expected to accelerate between 8 and 10 p.m., Adobe expects final online Black Friday numbers to be between a record $10.7 and $11 billion, in line with the $10.8 billion estimates from its Black Friday preview.

Shoppers were eager to buy skin and hair care products, air fryers, PlayStation 5 consoles, and Wicked-related toys. Black Friday sales continue to trend this holiday season with greater electronics, cosmetics, and appliance sales compared to average October 2024 sales, according to the data.

"Adobe is reaffirming its forecast that a new e-commerce record will be set on Black Friday and surge past the $10 billion mark," said Vivek Pandya, lead analyst of Adobe Digital Insights, in a statement. "This is being driven by big discounts in advance of Cyber Monday, as well as the continued acceleration of mobile commerce that is contributing to more impulse shopping."

However, many Americans are still cautious about spending as inflation remains above the Federal Reserve's 2% target. As of October 2024, the inflation rate was 2.6% year over year.

Retail researchers told The Washington Post that though consumer spending has remained resilient, record-high credit card debt and sticker shock over the last few years have made consumers — particularly those who are lower- or middle-income — more intentional about spending and alert to price comparisons. Consumers continue to flock to discount retailers while going to some big box stores like Target less often.

Shoppers have been increasingly relying on buy-now-pay-later purchases. This Black Friday, consumers are expected to spend $711.3 million using BNPL online — up 12.8% year over year — and $430 million on Thanksgiving.

Adobe data shows that Thanksgiving spending hit a record high this year. This Thanksgiving, consumers spent $6.1 billion online, up 8.8% from last year's $5.6 billion. Nearly 60% of online sales were from a mobile device, with sales peaking between 8 p.m. and 10 p.m.

Pandya said in a statement that this Thanksgiving had larger-than-anticipated discounts, which drove impulse shopping. Toys had discounts peak at 27.2% off the listed price, while apparel was 22.6%.

Consumers were willing to shell out hundreds of dollars on electronics, as Adobe data reveals the most expensive electronics goods had a 72% increase in the share of units sold compared to pre-season trends. Sporting goods increased by 44%, while appliances spiked by 36% compared to pre-season trends.

Adobe expects $5.2 billion in spending on Saturday, $5.6 billion on Sunday, and $13.2 billion on Cyber Monday, up 6.1% from last year.

Adobe is anticipating the greatest discounts on computers, peaking at 23% off the listed price. Adobe projects $40.6 billion in online spending this Cyber Week and $240.8 billion in total holiday spending.

• Amazon workers in more than 20 countries are set to protest between Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
• It's the fifth year Amazon workers have protested during the major shopping weekend.
• The company has downplayed the actions while separately taking some steps to meet workers' demands.

Workers in more than 20 countries, including the U.S., are set to protest or strike between Black Friday and Cyber Monday over wages, working conditions, and Amazon's environmental impact.

The protests are part of the fifth annual Make Amazon Pay campaign, organized by a coalition of labor and progressive organizations.

In New Delhi, where employees said Amazon kept them working during a heat wave this spring, workers plan to march on Parliament demanding higher wages and job protections. Workers in several German warehouses are set to walk off the job.

In New York City, workers affiliated with the Retail, Wholesale, and Department Store Union are marching on Amazon founder Jeff Bezos' penthouse.

Have the protests worked?

Yes and no.

Amazon has downplayed the protests, characterizing them as small-scale and saying the labor groups organizing Make Amazon Pay are presenting a misleadingly negative portrait of working at the company.

"The fact is at Amazon we provide great pay, great benefits, and great opportunities—all from day one," spokesperson Eileen Hards said in a statement. "We've created more than 1.5 million jobs around the world, and counting, and we provide a modern, safe, and engaging workplace whether you work in an office or at one of our operations buildings."

Separately, it has also taken steps that respond to some of protesters' demands, though not all workers say they're pleased with the company's rate of progress.

As labor groups make inroads into Amazon's U.S. fulfillment network, the company has boosted wages and broadcast its commitment to safety.

Over the past year, the Teamsters Union has scored several organizing victories in Amazon's American logistics operation. The Amazon Labor Union, which represents roughly 5,500 workers in a Staten Island warehouse, voted in June to affiliate with the Teamsters. Delivery drivers and air hub operators in California, Kentucky, and Atlanta also joined the Teamsters.

In September, Amazon raised wages for warehouse and transportation workers to an average of $22 per hour. In a post on its website, the company did not cite labor activism as a reason for the raises, saying they were "part of an annual process where we review our wages and benefits to ensure that they stay competitive."

What about Amazon's climate footprint?

This summer, Amazon also announced that it had met an ambitious climate target, of "matching" the electricity consumed by its global operations with renewable energy, while reducing its carbon footprint 3% from the prior year.

The company said it met that target seven years earlier than it had anticipated, in part by becoming the largest corporate purchaser of renewable energy in the world.

Members of Amazon Employees for Climate Justice, an organizing group of largely corporate workers, said the company's calculations did not include emissions from third-party merchants, who account for more than half the sales on Amazon's online store. Amazon has disputed the group's findings.

Amazon focused on "all the low-hanging fruit projects that it could. But now those are all done, and what we're seeing is they're not doing the hard stuff," Eliza Pan, a former Amazon employee and member of the climate group, told The Seattle Times in July.

Hards, the Amazon spokesperson, said Amazon is not done reducing its carbon footprint.

"Some actions will have immediate carbon savings, while others will take years to demonstrate results — and we will continue to invest in both proven and new science-backed solutions to help solve this crisis," Hards said.

What do the protests mean for Black Friday shopping?

Significant delays haven't occurred as a result of Make Amazon Pay protests in prior years, and it seems unlikely they will impact shipping times this year.

The holiday season is a significant revenue driver for the online retail giant. Amazon charted "record-breaking" holiday sales in the last three months of 2023. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said on an earnings call earlier this year. The company reported $170 billion in revenue that quarter, up 14% from the year prior.