With Valentine’s Day 2016 approaching fast, companies across the country are wondering if it’s already too late to get a sales boost from online and in-store shoppers alike. Luckily, holiday shopping hasn’t peaked yet. In fact, for businesses trying to make sales in certain categories, the biggest traffic from search engines is still to come.
Or at least, that’s what search engine Bing found when reviewing Valentine’s Day search traffic by category for 2015.
Although the search traffic for Valentine’s Day categories certainly received a marked boost starting on February 1, 2015, data suggests that the most searches for the holiday occur in the final week before the holiday, making next week the busiest time for people to search.
To drill down even further, Bing looked at how people searched the week of February 8 through the 14. Desktop user searches increased by 77% from the previous week, while mobile user searches increased by 71%. Furthermore, mobile devices accounted for 17% of clicks on Bing ads in 2015.
With about a week remaining until Valentine’s Day 2016, many marketers may be left wondering whether there’s still any value to buying ads on search engines. Since that depends largely on the products being offered in the ads, knowing when product categories peaked in the past is critical to making an informed decision this year. Bing found that search traffic peaks for 2015 on desktops and tablets were:
- Valentine’s Day Gifts – February 11
- Flowers – February 12
- Candy/Chocolate – February 13
- Jewelry – February 12
- Valentine’s Day Cards – February 14.
As far as sales potential goes, Bing also examined how many clicks the ads in various categories received across all devices:
- Valentine’s Day Gifts – 53%
- Flowers – 16%
- Jewelry – 12%
- Cards – 10%
- Restaurants/Recipes – 5%
- Candy/Chocolate – 3%.
While knowing search traffic peak days is useful, understanding exactly when click-through rates peak can help make paid ads even more effective, especially since desktop and mobile CTRs don’t peak at the same time:
- Overall CTR for February 10-14 – 4.9%
- Desktop CTR peak – February 12 from 2:00 to 8:00 p.m.
- Mobile CTR Peak – February 14 from 3:00 to 10:00 p.m.
In essence, it doesn’t matter which search categories businesses are trying to capitalize on this year or how their customers choose to search because the best search traffic and CTRs are still come. Of course, with only one more week before the Valentine’s Day 2016 shopping season comes to a close, the time to act is definitely now.
Source:
Marvin, Ginny. Valentine’s Day Searches Start Now: When They’ll Peak Depends on the Category. SearchEngineLand. February 1, 2016.
