Holiday Blueprint:
22 Proven Tactics for Conversion and Reactivation in Q4 and 2025

‘Tis the season for holiday preparation.

And there’s no room for mistakes because the festive frenzy represents up to 40% of a retailer’s annual sales. At the same time, the holiday season has become more complex than ever. 

Why? Because customer journeys are no longer linear. Shoppers enter the lifecycle at unpredictable times, often driven by a mix of online and in-store experiences. This complexity means retailers must vigilantly track and respond to customer signals across all touchpoints.

Here’s the bottom line: Black Friday, Cyber Monday (BFCM), and the rest of the holiday season can feel like tearing open a gift. All year, you wait for the opportunity and then it passes by in a flurry. But forward-looking retailers know this year’s holiday shopping is the foundation for next year’s success. 

Bluecore data shows 74% of a retailer’s customers are one-and-done. They make their first purchase, never to return. These fickle shoppers drag down retention averages consistently across every vertical. No industry is safe. 

But there’s good news: Once a customer buys twice, the likelihood they buy a third time increases by 95%.

What does this mean for retailers looking to capitalize on the holiday season? 

While planning for the holiday rush is essential, if you stop there, your hard-earned customers won’t stick around. To effectively convert shoppers to buyers and buyers to loyalists, you need a way to continually engage holiday shoppers into the new year. 

You need shopper identification and customer movement.

Most holiday prep guides focus on tactics designed to nail the sale. They leave out what happens (or should happen) post-purchase.

How much do you know about your holiday shoppers? For most retailers, the answer is not much. Based on shopper data from the entire 2023 calendar year, Bluecore’s Customer Growth Benchmarks Report found the average identification rate across industries is 21.1%. For many retailers, that number is less than 10%. 

Holiday shoppers stream in to buy gifts, then leave just as quickly. As a result, you’re left with a spike in sales but few ways to establish a deeper connection or start building brand loyalty. 

Talk about a missed opportunity. 

That’s why shopper identification is so important. With shopper identification, you can capture significantly more information on every shopper. And not just purchase information, but engagement details across their entire online presence. 

With identification data in hand, your marketing plan can expand to include signal-based strategies to move shoppers through the lifecycle. We call this customer movement — a marketing philosophy and framework centered on customers rather than channels to drive profitable growth. 

In this guide, we break down 22 proven tactics based on customer movement. Use these tactics to engage holiday shoppers, drive more sales, and set yourself up for a record-breaking 2025.

When put into practice, customer movement can increase a retailer’s third-year customer retention rate from 22% to 59%, on average, according to Bluecore research.

Shopping signals are the breadcrumbs that lead to deeper customer engagement opportunities. When you monitor and act upon triggers, your message meets shoppers at critical moments in their buying journey. 

For holiday shoppers, Bluecore emphasizes two categories of triggers: behavioral and merchandising.

Behavioral triggers are activated by customer actions, allowing you to personalize your approach and target shoppers with precision. For example, if a customer abandons their cart, a behavioral trigger can prompt an email reminder, increasing the likelihood they convert.

Merchandising triggers, on the other hand, are driven by product data. These triggers tap into important factors like price drops or product restocks. When set up effectively, merchandise triggers alert shoppers who previously viewed a product but didn’t purchase, encouraging them to revisit and potentially complete the sale.

Let’s look at high-impact triggers that weave together one or both of these trigger categories. Use these triggers during the holiday season and beyond.

Supercharged abandoned cart

Most retailers already send abandoned cart messaging. But a simple reminder about items left in your cart often isn’t enough to compel a purchase. Instead, take your abandoned cart game to the next level with persuasive, personalized messages and recommendations based on product signals such as category affinity.

This is a top-performing trigger. When a shopper adds an item to their cart, they are signaling high intent to purchase — or at a minimum, setting aside products for future consideration. Some may abandon their carts because they know they may be incentivized to complete their purchase with a discount later. Sending personalized reminders opens the door for them to reconsider the items and discover new products. 

How to do it:

• Shorten the path to conversion with pop-up modals
• Create holiday-specific creative for both mobile and desktop
• Use Targeting Rules that pair a cart event with an exit intent
• Add a side banner to be less intrusive

SMS alerts and reminders

Text me, maybe? Don’t skip out on SMS engagement, especially if it’s the preferred communication channel for your shoppers. Target your SMS subscribers with key promotions or new arrivals, and other timely messages, such as abandoned cart triggers. And take advantage of nurture messages to drive interaction with new subscribers. 

Customers who subscribe to SMS are the most likely to engage with the brand. Get a strong base of subscribers to target with SMS exclusives and build long-term relationships, and capture detailed profile data post-holiday. Because texting is so personal, relevant,  behavior-based communications are great for keeping shoppers engaged.

How to do it:

1. Exclusive Offers: Send SMS-exclusive discount codes or early access to sales, making your subscribers feel like VIPs.
2. New Arrivals Alerts: Notify subscribers about new product launches, ensuring they’re the first to know.
3. Abandoned Cart Triggers: Remind customers of items left in their carts, paired with a limited-time discount to encourage completion.
4. Flash Sales: Run short, time-sensitive promotions that create urgency and drive quick conversions.
5. Nurture Messages: Welcome new subscribers with a series of nurture messages that introduce them to your brand, showcase popular products, and highlight ongoing offers.
6. Personalized Recommendations: Use purchase history and preferences to send tailored product suggestions that match their interests.
7. Event Reminders: Inform subscribers about upcoming events, whether in store or online, and offer special incentives to participate.

Back in Stock + While You Wait

Don’t let out of stock items end the conversation. Immediately engage interested shoppers with similar in-stock products they may be interested in while they wait for their product to come back in stock.

Notify shoppers when top products are back in stock. And maintain momentum by surfacing alternative options when they view out-of-stock products.

How to do it: Start with a strong “Back in Stock” sequence — this is a high-performing trigger that brings shoppers back. Then, trigger the “While You Wait” pop-up modal after a shopper signs up for a “Back in Stock” notification or on exit behavior after engaging with a product that is out of stock. You can also send an email if you’ve already identified the shopper and have their email address.

For example, include “Size not in stock? Check these out instead” or “Didn’t find what you were looking for? Try this…” messaging in the modal.

Importantly, you must have integrated inventory data to run this tactic. 

Smart Content promos

Create a personalized shopping experience with smart content promos. Smart content promos use data-driven insights to deliver highly relevant offers, messages, or content to specific segments of your audience. Execute this tactic by including banners across all emails to amplify targeted promotions. You can also change your banner content by category, active promotion, loyalty status or other product. 

When you show shoppers how well you know their preferences by offering promos relevant to them, you create a sense of urgency to purchase before the promo ends. 

How to do it: Use promo pushes in email banners. Set time limits for how often the promos appear. And entice shoppers to opt into SMS messaging for exclusive holiday offers. 

Wishlist

Shoppers start browsing long before the official holiday season begins. Capture their interest in an easy-to-buy location. When you re-engage shoppers before and during the holidays, you can drive additional purchases and product discovery. 

How to do it: Create a campaign based on wishlist actions and target shoppers with new holiday creative, including recommendations. Consider sending this multiple times as customers engage with your brand.

Social proofing

The fear of missing out is real. Use social proof to motivate your shoppers to take action right away. Highlight the most popular products and track shopping behavior to test and learn about prospects.

Social proofing increases conversion rates by up to 5%. Plus, it’s not tied to seasonality, so this tactic can be used year-round.

How to do it: Highlight product trends on your website by pulling data and using lookbacks from the product catalog. Call out the following:  

1. Recently Viewed (by others)
2. Recently Purchased 
3. Selling Fast / Likely to Sell Out Soon
4. Low Stock 
5. Best Sellers

Bluecore Pro Tip: Surface hidden gems

To boost your conversion rates and customer lifetime value, identify products that may be flying under the radar — those with low traffic but high conversion rates. These “hidden gems” are often overlooked, but they hold significant potential to engage new shoppers and drive sales.

Once identified, you can create messaging that highlights these high-converting products to audiences that have an affinity for them, ensuring they reach the most relevant and purchase-ready audience.

But it doesn’t stop there. By tapping into predictive modeling, you can further enhance your strategy by sending lifecycle stage-specific messaging — for example, showcase hidden gem products to at-risk buyers, pulling them back in for a purchase. This approach nurtures customer relationships, guiding them along the purchase lifecycle and encouraging repeat business.

The end result? An increase in customer lifetime value as you maximize the potential of these hidden gem products and build stronger, long-lasting customer relationships. And the best part is: Bluecore’s AI-powered insights surface hidden gems for you.

Personalized batch email tactics offer a powerful way to engage large segments of your audience at once. Deliver timely, relevant messages based on collective customer behavior or product trends. Unlike individual triggers, which are reactive to shopper and product behaviors, batch tactics are proactive, enabling you to target customers who share similar shopping patterns or product interests anytime you want.

For example, if a segment of your customers have been browsing winter coats, a batch email can send a targeted promotion to those customers, encouraging them to make a purchase before the cold weather hits.

Ultimately, batch emails increase your marketing efficiency, drive higher engagement, and build stronger connections with customers.

Here are batch emails you can put to work today.

Category-specific gift guides

Holiday shopping is a marathon, not a sprint. It may take your shopper a few training sessions and a nudge before they’re ready to make a purchase decision. For example, a shopper who browsed several similar items, but didn’t buy any, may be an indecisive or overwhelmed gift giver. A gift guide could provide the inspiration they need, increasing AOV and conversions with  personalized product recommendations that aid in discovery.

How to do it: Develop category-driven gift guides for your product catalog. Build audiences of shoppers who have bought from those categories and have a predicted affinity for the category. Share relevant category gift guides with each audience via email. Go a step further by creating a direct mail campaign for high predicted lifetime value customers. 

Shopper early perks

Not everyone likes the holiday rush. Some prefer to shop before the season to get it out of the way early. Incentivize pre-BFCM shopping with discounts and worry-free shipping times. Since  41% of consumers start shopping before November, this can build up additional revenue before key shopping days.

How to do it: Build an audience of customers who are actively engaged via email and on your site. Showcase Best Sellers, Co-recommendations, and Trending Products as the product recs.

Discount affinity targeting

Some shoppers are all about the deal. Identify which shoppers are most responsive to discounts (including which types of discounts), then tailor your promotions to resonate with their buying behavior. This targeted approach boosts sales and engages a significant category of customers.

At the same time, only sending promotional offers to customers with a discount affinity helps preserve margins — and avoid building a reputation as a discount brand.

How to do it: Build audiences of customers based on discount affinity. Share unique offers with each group based on what they need to buy (e.g. free shipping vs. 10% off).

Target last year’s shoppers

Bring last year’s online holiday shoppers back to your site with targeted messaging and recommendations. Nurture another purchase (or a first purchase if they only browsed last year).

Showing 1:1 product recommendations better retains past shoppers and drives repeat traffic to your site. Driving second purchases from first-time buyers presents significant revenue potential in both the short- and long-term. It’s important to note some people might only be holiday shoppers — and that’s okay. But, when possible, it’s more cost-effective to reactivate a shopper than acquire a new one. 

How to do it: Build an audience of customers who bought only online last year from October through December and haven’t purchased since (or ever). Showcase “Next Best Purchase” as the product recommendations. Target the audience across channels with dynamic product recommendations based on their browsing and holiday purchases from last year.

Give loyalty members the VIP treatment

Your loyalty program members are among your most valuable customers. Giving them the VIP treatment significantly lifts their engagement and brand loyalty.

Keeping loyalty top of mind ahead of holiday gives members reasons to shop early and often. Consider offering exclusive perks, early access to new products, and personalized offers to make your loyalty members feel appreciated and valued.

How to do it: Send email campaigns to loyalty subscribers hours before to give them VIP access. Or offer a coupon code for BFCM to allow them to shop early.
Capture data at multiple points

Bluecore Pro Tip: Highlight your cash cows

Boost your sales with personalized batch campaigns by focusing on your “cash cows” — the products that bring in the most revenue. Capture the attention of both loyal customers and new shoppers with these proven best sellers.

Bonus: This strategy encourages your VIPs to explore additional categories, potentially increasing their overall spend.

Paid media campaigns extend your brand’s reach and engage shoppers who haven’t discovered you yet. With targeted campaigns, cut through the noise and be efficient in connecting with a purchase-ready audience.

When equipped with identification data, these campaigns can be finely tuned to focus on high-intent shoppers, specific demographics, and re-engaging past customers. This level of precision reduces your CAC and increases your click-through and conversion rates.

Take advantage of these proven paid media tactics to increase your brand’s visibility and boost conversion rates during the holiday season and beyond.

Product badging

Spotlight a high-performing product with a special status to turn hesitant shoppers into confident buyers and accelerate the path to purchase. Product badging serves as social proof (“best seller”) or creates a sense of urgency (“low stock”). 

Similar to social proof, product badging leverages merchandise signals to accelerate the path to purchase. Badges range from confidence-instilling “best seller” to stock and sale notifications.

How to do it: Let shoppers know when a product they’re interested in meets certain criteria such as: 

1. New Arrivals
2. Best Sellers
3. Low Stock
4. Back in Stock
5. On Sale

Retarget lapsed buyers from last year

Customers who haven’t purchased in over a year aren’t gone. They just need to be reactivated. Strategically retarget these lapsed buyers with personalized offers to spark their interest and bring them back into your orbit. 

Winning back lapsed buyers may have the added benefit of pushing a customer to re-subscribe to your emails.

How to do it: Create an audience of customers who have lapsed or unsubscribed in the last 365 days. Tailor your messaging to remind them of what they loved about your brand and offer compelling reasons to return. This approach revives dormant relationships and also taps into a valuable segment that can drive growth and revenue.

Retarget non-clickers

Create a cross-channel journey to target customers in different channels depending on the actions they do — or do not — take after receiving an email. Keep your audience engaged with relevant product content using fresh, accurate data. Consistent messaging and product highlights ensure that your brand is top of mind for shoppers throughout the holiday season, instilling brand recognition and recall. 

How to do it: Use your journey builder to create an initial email to an intended audience and then split the audience to either continue down an email journey or target them on social if they do not click an email. Bluecore customers can use Experience Designer™ for this.

Bluecore Pro Tip: Recreate valuable shoppers

Enhance your marketing strategy by building lookalike audiences based on your most valuable shoppers. 

Start by sorting your customers using metrics like Predicted Customer Lifetime Value (PCLV), which helps you pinpoint those with the highest long-term value. Once you’ve defined this group, you can target new, untapped shoppers who exhibit similar behaviors and preferences. 

This approach allows you to expand your reach effectively, connecting with potential customers who are more likely to engage and convert.

Your website is the front line of your holiday sales strategy, and optimizing it for the season is crucial to capturing and converting the surge of holiday traffic. With the right tweaks and enhancements, your site can become a seamless, shopper-friendly destination that not only attracts visitors but also turns them into loyal customers.

Focus on identification tactics and conversion modals to increase your email list for better retargeting, faster conversions, and meaningful, long-term growth. 

Set your site up for success with these power-packed tactics.

Abandoned cart upsell

An abandoned cart is not just a sale opportunity — it’s also a chance to increase the value of the purchase. Incorporate upsell suggestions into your abandoned cart modals to encourage customers to complete their purchase and consider additional, higher-value items. 

Tailor these upsell offers based on the shopper’s browsing history or complementary products to what they left behind. This strategy not only recovers lost sales but also maximizes the potential revenue from each transaction.

Running conditional promotions that require shoppers to meet a minimum amount before qualifying for an offer is common. Remind the shopper how much they have left before qualifying and surface product recommendations within a certain price range that are relevant to them or the products already in their cart, and drive higher average order values.

How to do it: Drive higher cart sizes by upselling your shopper to a minimum order value to qualify for free shipping. Promote stocking stuffer products on the site campaign (if applicable). Plus, use discount affinity signals with exit capture to show abandoned cart items. 

Notify Me Back in Stock

Popular items tend to go out of stock. But that’s no reason to lose a customer purchase. Offer shoppers the option to sign up for notifications when an out-of-stock product they shopped for is back in stock. By keeping subscribers in the know when inventory changes, you can drive conversions as soon as new stock drops.

How to do it: Set up a notify me modal or back-in-stock email to trigger when products are back in stock. You can also tap into Smart Content by using your loyalty data to only show program banners and sign-up incentives to customers who are not yet loyalty members.

Category affinity recommendation modal

Shoppers are exposed to hundreds of holiday special deals and promotions. Help them through the chaos of holiday shopping and grab their attention by showing them messages focused on the categories that they have high affinities.

Your customers’ category affinity is the key that unlocks relevant content and offers that resonate with their interests. With Bluecore, the algorithms automatically analyze which category a shopper has the greatest preference for.

This increases the likelihood of conversion and deepens customer engagement, promoting a stronger connection with your brand and encouraging repeat purchases.

How to do it: If you don’t have a pre-built category affinity modal, try a simple quiz, asking what customers are shopping for (i.e. toys, decoration, wrapping). Once they choose their selection, you can use that information to target these specific shoppers with category-specific discounts and products. Even better, this tactic can be run without any explicit data collection from the customers themselves. You simply take advantage of category affinity data in their profile.

Drive loyalty program sign-ups

Prioritize your loyalty members and attract more of them.  Incentives motivate shoppers to join and use loyalty programs. They also know they will receive personalized rewards, driving more purchases.

How to do it: Add banners to batch emails and prompt new shoppers to sign up. 

• Speak to loyalty member perks.
• Offer extra incentives to sign up:
• Exclusive early access
• Bonus points (no purchase needed)
• Personalized welcome offers
• Extra points (2x) on their first loyalty purchase

Bluecore Pro Tip: Capture data at multiple points

Design site capture experiences that engage shoppers at various stages of their shopping journey. 

Add entry capture modals to welcome visitors and collect valuable information when they land on your site. Use exit capture modals to re-engage shoppers who are about to leave, offering incentives or reminders that encourage them to stay or complete their purchase. And deploy browse abandon capture modals to target shoppers who have shown interest in specific products but haven’t yet added them to their cart. 

You can also reach for cart abandonment, social proof, and re-engagement modals to optimize your site data gathering.  

Bluecore data shows that retailers focused on channel-led growth see an average three-year customer retention rate of 22%. On the other hand, retail leaders who have embraced customer movement see an average three-year customer retention rate of 59%.

To help retailers unlock customer movement, we offer Bluecore’s proprietary Customer Movement Assessment to dive deep into a retailer’s shopper data to find performance gaps and opportunities, comparing it to our peer index of 200+ companies.

The Customer Movement Assessment includes: 

• Full customer file analysis
• Peer benchmarking for identification and retention
• Bottom-up trended forecast
• Campaigns to move customers through the funnel

Retailers who complete a Customer Movement Assessment walk away with a detailed strategy for achieving their growth priorities using the power of customer movement, whether you choose to work with Bluecore or another partner. Get your assessment started and join the (customer) movement.