Black Friday 2026: Your Preparation Guide

Black Friday 2026 is just around the corner, and after yet another year of AI enhancements and changes to the way that advertising platforms work, advertisers should aim to be prepare for the biggest online ecommerce event of the year as soon as possible.

Black Friday 2026: 5 Tips To Get Started

This isn’t a comprehensive list of things to do before the Black Friday period, but rather a few pointers to get started. Stay tuned for more insights and Black Friday tips over the next few weeks, as we countdown to another huge day for online retail.

Think Way Ahead

Black Friday no longer starts on Black Friday, and every year, demand seems to begin earlier and earlier. Shoppers are hitting more touchpoints than ever before making a purchase, including a longer research and consideration period that takes different products, businesses, and pricing into account. Consider this in the months leading up to Black Friday, and make sure that you’re serving the right audiences, prioritising Quality Score, and including detailed descriptions of product attributes in both ad copy and on product landing pages.

Utilise Creative Variation

Never underestimate the power of creative variation in ads – especially across Paid Social channels. Creative differentiation during the Black Friday period is essential in combatting ad fatigue, preventing wasted ad spend, and cutting through feed saturation highlighting similar offers. Esther Jackson, Circus PPC’s Paid Social Analyst, said:

Make creative a priority, not an afterthought. Creative is one of the key tools businesses have to influence performance on Meta. Don’t rely on one winning ad forever- keep testing, learning and refreshing your creative.

Automate Important Tasks

During the Black Friday weekend, there is so much to do and to change – which is why setting up automated rules can be really helpful and both save you the time and effort spent making manual updates. You can use automated rules to swap out ad copy, automatically increase budgets, adjust target ROAS to become more aggressive during peak periods, monitor out-of-stock items, and so much more.

Keep Offers At The Forefront

Black Friday is a huge event that many online shoppers take advantage of, and may often be looking for specific product offers. Keep messaging simple in ad copy to highlight promotional offers for this period, rather than going into complex product details. Typically, the research and consideration period for shoppers prior to Black Friday happens in the months before, with many ready to purchase during the actual event. Not having the discounted price in your ads could be what stops them buying from you, and going to a competitor instead.

Reward Existing Loyalty

Black Friday isn’t just about new customer acquisition, and a lot of the time, existing customers that are already aware of your brand are the ones driving the most revenue during peak sales periods. In fact, according to a Black Friday 2025 report by Ometria, over half (55%) of revenue came from existing customers, and of new customers who made repeat purchases within 12 months, 75% did so during the Black Friday period.

Tiered loyalty perks such as reward points, SMS and email waitlists, and VIP early access are all ways to reward loyalty from existing customers by giving them something that isn’t readily available to the general public. This doesn’t only create anticipation for Black Friday itself, but incentivises existing customers further to purchase from you over a competitor.

Key Takeaways

There’s no one-size-fits-all method to success during the Black Friday period. But, there are plenty of across-the-board action that can and should be taken into consideration before, during, and even after the Black Friday period.

Over the next few weeks, we’ll be sharing more and more insights and tips into how you can make Black Friday 2026 the most successful Black Friday yet – stay tuned!