Black Friday and Cyber Monday - Did you crack?

It's that time of the year so I thought this week's post would be a little lighter and less serious. In the USA, Black Friday saw a record $7.4B in online sales with $2.9B of it spent using smartphones. Clearly in the USA, people are fast moving to smartphones as their primary device for e-commerce. Remember 61% of all online traffic comes from smartphones (Techcrunch).

In Africa, the percentage of online traffic coming from online devices is likely to be higher since many people only have a smartphone. As developers, testers, analysts and designers, the world is clearly going mobile and mobile skills will be at a premium. I would bet on the emphasis on mobile increasing as companies try and reduce the load on call centres and encourage people to use self-service portals.

In South Africa, Game opened at midnight and their Smart TVs created queues. Takealot advertised deals and the site was very busy over the weekend. Bankserv said they processed over 7M transactions (online and in store), a 36% increase on last year. This equated to a total spend of R6 billion, which is 106% increase on 2018 (Moneyweb). So much for a lack of consumer confidence?

The cynic in me wonders why most people bother. Unless you were going to buy that sale item anyway, then the best way to save money is to keep it in your pocket. Apologies if I sound like Scrooge McDuck or the Grinch.

Some of the lucky ones go on leave today (not me) or next week Friday. Enjoy your break. Our offices will be open throughout the season and we are here to help you with your career questions. Please don't hesitate to email us with any questions.