With holiday gifts now successfully delivered, the question remains, were retailers able to deliver on year-end sales goals? In its annual Holiday Shopping Season Report, Market Track, the leading provider of advertising, promotional, brand protection and eCommerce intelligence solutions, found that deeper discounts and shifts in advertising strategy paved the way for robust 2016 holiday sales levels that had not been seen since the 2005 season.

Titled, Looking Back: A Review of the 2016 Holiday Shopping Season, the report highlights key trends that helped retailers and brands compete this season. The full report can be downloaded and accessed here: www.markettrack.com/holiday2016.

The 2016 Christmas Creep coupled with how the holiday fell on the calendar this year, prompted retailers to provide highly competitive online prices throughout the season on top holiday items. Select products at Amazon, Best Buy, Target and Walmart were priced lower on Super Saturday than on Black Friday (11/25). For example, a Smart TV at Amazon was 55% lower on Super Saturday than the price on Black Friday. Similarly, on Target.com, the price for a newly released Xbox game was 42% lower on Super Saturday than on Black Friday. Market Track’s ‘Category Online Price Index’ found that Black Friday weekend offered the deepest discounts overall on the largest number of products.

“Driving traffic and creating urgency during what has essentially become a two month long sales event presents both challenges and opportunity,” said Traci Gregorski, senior vice president of marketing at Market Track. “Leading retailers have embraced the change in consumer behavior that allows them to engage shoppers across digital, mobile, social media, email, TV and print. They are ensuring they are offering competitive pricing and promotions throughout the entire season by taking a synergistic approach to their overall marketing programs. Insights from our ‘Competitive Online Price Index’ and ‘Print Circular Discounts’ show some of the strategic shifts that occurred this season and will serve as a guide for retailers already planning and preparing for 2017.”

About Market Track

Headquartered in Chicago, Illinois, Market Track is the leading provider of subscription-based advertising, promotion and eCommerce intelligence solutions in North America. Through monitoring trade and promotional advertising, pricing and e-commerce activity, brand protection and competitive advertising activity, Market Track provides the most comprehensive coverage of key media channels available. Market Track’s solutions enable advertisers, agencies, retailers, and manufacturers of consumer goods to efficiently monitor and analyze causal data, creative execution, and ad spending to maximize the value of their marketing campaigns. Clients use Market Track’s capabilities to determine how competing retailers, products and brands are being advertised, priced and promoted both in-store and online. The company’s granular creative assets and data cover nearly every retail trade class, product category and media channel. For more information, please visit, www.markettrack.com.