Black Friday Marketing Strategy for Service Providers: How to Plan Your Clients’ Campaigns (and Your Own Offer) Starting Now
If your Black Friday marketing strategy starts on November 1st, you’re already behind. And so are your clients.
Here’s what I see every single year. Clients don’t start thinking about their Black Friday plan until November 1st. Then we’re dropping balls. Everything has to be done super quickly. Things aren’t done well because nobody planned for it.
And then there’s the other group. The people who have it in their head that Black Friday is only for e-commerce. That couldn’t be further from the truth.
So I brought in one of my favorite people to nerd out on marketing with. Andy Franco is one of our Strategist Society members, and he’s been in digital marketing for 23- 24 years. His mom started an e-commerce site in the late ’90s (talk about ahead of her time) and got him into SEO and paid media in the early 2000s. Since then, he’s run an SEO agency, a website development agency, and a Facebook ads agency.
This is definitely not his first, second, or third Black Friday. So let’s talk about what to do right now, for your clients and for your own business.
Why Your Black Friday Marketing Strategy Starts With Lead Generation
Andy said something that I want you to write down.
“You have 11 months of the year to prepare for Black Friday, and then you have the month of November.”
The biggest thing to focus on from now until the offer goes live is filling the funnel. Lead generation, social media, people you pixel, people on the email list. Fill the funnel.
Why? Because this is the biggest buying time of the entire year. As Andy put it, the planet has literally been programmed to spend. And every industry, B2C or B2B, has a play.
Black Friday Is Not the Time to Go After Cold Audiences
This is the one thing people don’t understand. Black Friday is not about going after new customers.
Yeah, we can spend a small percentage of the budget there. But between the CPMs and the auction, it’s just not the time. You know who’s going after cold audiences that week? The big dogs. Walmart. Target. We are not playing in those games.
Once the promo goes live, that’s the time for retargeting the warm audience you’ve been building all year. And if your client hasn’t been doing lead generation? Start now.
How to Talk to Your Clients About Black Friday (Do This in October)
The first thing you have to do is have a conversation with your clients. I would send a message to every single one of them that says, “Do you plan on having a Black Friday promotion?”
Anyone who says yes, jump on a call right then. “Great. We need to get this dialed in now and create a timeline so we have the best results and expectations are set.”
And get clear on their definition of Black Friday, because everyone’s definition has changed. For some people it’s literally Friday. For some it’s the Monday before Thanksgiving through the Monday after. For others it’s all of November and into December.
What to Do When a Client Says No
Okay so, should you push it or let it be? This is where you become the detective.
If a client says, “No, I’m not doing one,” you can ask, “Oh, do you mind me asking why?”
If the answer is “it hasn’t worked in the past” or “I don’t do discounts,” those are things you can overcome. Andy told me most new clients say exactly that. His honest reaction in the back of his mind? “Yeah, just because you have no idea what you’re doing.” He’s had clients who refuse to discount, ever, and they still make it work.
But if it’s a values thing, that’s a different conversation. Real talk, that’s me. We value time off with our family, and we don’t want our team working during that time. We’ve done Black Fridays before because of the pressure of the marketing, and we came to the conclusion that it just doesn’t work with our values. That doesn’t mean we don’t do sales in November. We just don’t do it on Black Friday.
So if a client is a hard no on the actual weekend, great. Do they want to run a sale before that? They still get the buying season, and you respect their values.
Know Your Own Stance Too
Are you going to be working that weekend? You can have everything scheduled and tell your clients, “I’m going to have everything ready for you, but I’m not available that weekend. I’ll get you a full report afterwards.” You do not have to be on call.
This Is What Being a Strategist Actually Looks Like
Andy has kept clients for 10-plus years, and he told me exactly why.
“I’m not just a button pusher. I’m as much a strategic advisor as I am somebody who runs their ads.”
You can be a robot who pushes buttons. Or you can show your clients the opportunities they can’t see on their own. Andy has clients who make 30% of their yearly revenue in the month of November. When you’re the person who brought that to the table, you are not getting replaced.
That’s the whole strategist approach, friends. And if that’s the shift you’re ready to make, that is exactly what we do inside Strategist Society.
What Makes a Good Black Friday Offer
Andy tries to have everything done two weeks before any promotion starts. And the thing that takes the most time isn’t building the ads or the emails. It’s crafting the offer. Once the offer is dialed in, the build is actually pretty easy.
I know some of you are thinking, “It’s not my job to come up with the offer.” For some of you, it is. For others it isn’t. But your job is to know whether that offer is a good offer for Black Friday.
If you don’t know what makes a good offer, consider this your wake-up sign. You don’t need a course. What makes a good offer has been the same for the last 60 years. Pick up any of Russell Brunson’s books. Pick up Hormozi’s books.
Andy’s test is simple. If you don’t say “wow” to that offer, it’s not going to resonate with anybody else. People aren’t just looking for something special on Black Friday. They’re expecting it.
Black Friday Offer Ideas That Work
- Deep discounts. Andy says 40 to 50% off is what moves the needle. 20 or 30% doesn’t cut it. The exception is the client who never discounts. For them, 25 or 30% could work.
- Bundles. If a client has two SLOs that completely crush, package them up as a double feature. A two-for-one on the best sellers. We’ve done this.
- Storewide sale. Digital storefront? The whole store is 30% off, and you spotlight the best sellers. That’s the easiest one.
- Exclusive offers for clients who won’t discount. A special package, or a product that’s only available for Black Friday. It takes some finagling and some really good copy, but you can make it work.
- Local business deals. Come in today and get X percent off, today only. You can run that through Messenger or instant forms.
And here’s language you can only use this time of year: “our biggest sale of the year” or “our only sale of the year.” Andy tells his clients to discount during the rest of the year if they want, but save the biggest discount for right now so they can literally say that.
Don’t Put the High Ticket Offer on Sale
If your client runs something like a 12-week program as their high-ticket offer, Andy typically doesn’t recommend putting that up for Black Friday. You want to preserve the integrity of that offer for when it actually goes live. Think mid-ticket and low-ticket items, bundled or packaged together.
The Real Point of Black Friday: Building a Buyers List
Most businesses don’t make money on the first sale. A lot of people don’t understand that.
They put out a $47 product and think they’re going to make money. The point of that is to lose money, y’all. The hardest thing is getting a new customer. Once a buyer’s a buyer, it doesn’t matter if it’s $47 or $10,000. As long as you have buyers on your list, you can turn them into more buyers.
Andy compares it to a loss leader at the grocery store. The end cap stuff is sold at a loss or break-even because they know you’re going to buy other stuff. Most clients don’t know their customer lifetime value. If they did, that first purchase would make a lot more sense.
So Black Friday does three things:
- It gets fence sitters off the fence. They come into the ecosystem, even on a low ticket or deep discount.
- It cleans out the list. If they don’t buy during the most compelling time of the year, they’re probably never going to buy.
- It sets up Q1. A lot of people launch in January, and walking into that launch with a fresh list of buyers is so much stronger.
And don’t forget the people who already bought but haven’t gone to the next thing. How can you have an offer just for them? Black Friday is like an onion. So many layers.
How to Set Up Black Friday Ad Campaigns
How Long the Sale Should Run
Andy estimated around $50 billion was spent last year over the four days from Black Friday through Cyber Monday. And here’s something most people don’t know: Cyber Monday is actually the bigger buying day.
So he recommends one of two options:
- A four-day sale, Friday through Monday
- An eight-day sale, the Monday before Black Friday through Cyber Monday
Most of our clients can do amazingly well with just four days. Ads for four days straight, plus six emails: two on Black Friday, one Saturday, one Sunday, and two on Cyber Monday.
If your client says, “I want to do 14 days,” push back. It’s just like launches. Extending open cart doesn’t usually make more money. Give people a deadline, and they make a decision.
The Minimum Black Friday Ad Budget
I asked Andy for a minimum, and he said $200 a day, so $800 for a four-day promotion. We didn’t talk about this beforehand, and the number in my head was $1,000. So we’re right there.
Your client also needs to know that with low-ticket, heavily discounted offers, the goal is not profit. It’s creating customers who purchase later. Set that expectation up front. And it’s not just ads. Emails are imperative too.
Campaign Type and Retargeting Audiences
- Run sales campaigns. The only exception is a client with a super small audience, where you may have to run traffic.
- Turn off Advantage+. All of it. We don’t want a new audience. We want the people our clients have been building up all year.
- Upload the email list. The week before, get their most up-to-date list and build a custom audience from it.
- Build retargeting audiences. Andy usually does 30-day audiences across Instagram, Facebook, and the website. If the following is really small, go to 90 days. If your client runs launches and picked up a lot of people six months ago, you may need to go out to 180.
Bonus: Branded Search Campaigns on Google
Andy called this the low-hanging fruit. Run Google search ads on the client’s company name and branded product names.
The clicks are very inexpensive. People see an email or an ad, can’t remember how they got there, and go search for the brand. If the Black Friday promo is sitting in that search ad, it can be a massive revenue generator. Such a value add for clients.
Your Black Friday Checklist for Client Campaigns
Here’s the recap of what to do right now:
1. Find out which clients are running Black Friday and which are opposed to it. Have the conversation with the ones who are opposed and figure out why.
2. Schedule the calls. Get the game plan, the dates, and the deadlines for creatives and URLs.
3. Set the budget and the expectations.
4. Create your audiences.
5. Make sure the offer is a slam dunk. Just gold.
6. Set up the campaigns and have everything scheduled a week out minimum, so you’re not doing it on Thanksgiving Day.
7. Track the metrics and deliver a full report and debrief of what worked and what didn’t, so you can prepare for next year.
And if they’re not already running lead generation, get that going and keep it going right up until the promo.
Should Freelancers and Service Providers Run Their Own Black Friday Offer?
I asked Andy this directly, and his answer was “Absolutely. Black Friday is for everyone.”
His ideas: a full audit at a super discounted price, or a three-month package at 40% off. And cap it. “I’m taking on four new clients at 40% off as a Black Friday only special.” Add an intake form so you can cherry-pick who you work with.
He said you have nothing to lose, and I pushed back. You do. You have time. A lot of you are moms, and time is of the essence.
So here’s what I like more. I used to do 90-minute intensives that ran anywhere from $1,000 to $2,500. Discount that 50 or 70% for Black Friday? I’m great with that.
Because what I teach with intensives is that they should leave thinking, “Holy bananas, I could never do this on my own.” Then they hire you. At $250 or $300, it’s a paid discovery call at the end of the day. You got paid to build the strategy and the budget with the client, which is the part you usually do by yourself for free. And so many of them turn into retainer clients.
We get to do whatever we want, and that’s what’s beautiful about it. Just be strategic.
If you’re still building your skills and landing those first clients, start at conversionsforclients.com.
Stop Waiting on Referrals to Fill Your Pipeline
His agency has been 100% referral-based for 11 years. Wonderful, until the referrals dry up. Feast or famine. In his words, “I’m the marketer who’s really good at marketing other people’s business but doesn’t spend much energy marketing my own.”
Sound familiar?
That’s why he joined Strategist Society. Marketing minutes are the thing we have the most control over, and the thing a lot of us don’t want to do. But they put you in the driver’s seat.
Andy also built a Black Friday revenue calculator. Plug in your industry, your following, your list size, and what you’d sell, and it shows what you could make. He said we can share it: https://blackfriday.andyfranco.com/.
Now Go Send That Message
Black Friday isn’t just for e-commerce, and it isn’t something you figure out on November 1st. Send that message to every client today. Find out who’s in, get the offer dialed in, build the audiences, and have it all scheduled before the turkey’s in the oven.
Your clients need you to see the opportunities they can’t. Go do the dang thing.
If you’re ready to stop being the button pusher and scale past $10K months as the strategist, come join us in Strategist Society. And come tell me on Instagram @brandimowles what your Black Friday plan is. I want to hear it.
This post is based on an episode of the Serve Scale Soar podcast, where I help one-on-one service providers build profitable, scalable businesses without the hustle. Listen to the full conversation with Andy Franco wherever you get your podcasts.
** This post may contain affiliate links, which means I may receive a small commission at no additional cost to you if you use one of the links to purchase. This helps keep the podcast going and I only share products I have used, tested, and love.”
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Brandi Mowles is the host of the Serve Scale Soar® podcast which is a podcast dedicated to helping service-based entrepreneurs scale their online business to five-figure months so they can soar into six-figure years. Brandi is a wife, mom and in less than one year, created a six-figure business. Now she is spilling all her secrets so you can too.
