Move over, Prime Day; Amazon’s Cyber Monday takes the crown

Amazon’s inventory of superlatives may be running low.

The online retail giant had its single biggest day of sales ever on Cyber Monday, according to Adobe Analytics, based on the number of products sold globally. This beats its Prime Day in July — which had previously been Amazon’s biggest sales day.

Why you should care

Amazon remained king of a record-breaking weekend, garnering 28 percent of all web sales over the holiday weekend, not counting its Prime Now and Fresh divisions. That is seven times its nearest online competitor, Best Buy.

Overall, online stores sold $7.9 billion worth of goods on Cyber Monday, almost 20 percent higher than last year, Adobe reported. That tops Black Friday’s $6.2 billion. Saturday and Sunday set their own records as the biggest online shopping weekend, with $6.4 billion.

Amazon itself said that it sold more products during the “Turkey 5” — the five days from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday — than in any previous five days in its history. Amazon didn’t reveal a breakdown sales figures, but did say it shipped over 180 million items in those five days. It also saw a 20 percent boost in sales from small-to-medium sized businesses (SMBs) on Black Friday, compared to last year. This is an area the company has been particularly focused on with efforts such as “Storefronts” section featuring products from more than 20,000 SMBs.

Jeff Wilke, CEO for Amazon Worldwide Consumer, pointed to several factors for his company’s continued retail success including, “curated gift guides, convenient shopping experiences, incredible product selection, and free shipping with no minimum purchase amount.”

More on holiday commerce trends

• Including both Black Friday and Cyber Monday, Amazon said it sold about 18 million toys and 13 million fashion items.
• The top sellers: the Echo Dot Alexa, followed by AncestryDNA’s ethnicity testing kit and the Bose QuietComfort 25 Acoustic Noise Canceling Headphones for Apple devices.
• Amazon wasn’t alone in its success. Other major retailers also saw banner holiday weekend boosts for their online sales: Best Buy was up 36 percent, Target increased 47 percent and Walmart jumped 76 percent, Rakuten Intelligence said.

About The Author

Barry Levine

Barry Levine covers marketing technology for Third Door Media. Previously, he covered this space as a Senior Writer for VentureBeat, and he has written about these and other tech subjects for such publications as CMSWire and NewsFactor. He founded and led the web site/unit at PBS station Thirteen/WNET; worked as an online Senior Producer/writer for Viacom; created a successful interactive game, PLAY IT BY EAR: The First CD Game; founded and led an independent film showcase, CENTER SCREEN, based at Harvard and M.I.T.; and served over five years as a consultant to the M.I.T. Media Lab. You can find him at LinkedIn, and on Twitter at xBarryLevine.