How to prepare your online store for Black Friday and Cyber Monday: a technical, operational, and marketing checklist from Solomono

Black Friday and Cyber Monday are a test of your store's endurance. If the site is slow or the checkout doesn't work, buyers will go to your competitors. As a result, your business loses sales and customer trust. This Black Friday checklist for online stores will help you prepare your store for Black Friday in advance and scale your online store before the sale so that you can handle peak loads without any glitches and make the most of seasonal sales.

According to Adobe Analytics, in 2024, US shoppers spent a record $10.8 billion online on Black Friday and $13.3 billion on Cyber Monday — and these figures are growing every year. If your store's pages load slowly or the checkout doesn't work, the buyer will simply go to a competitor. Therefore, preparing your store for Cyber Monday and Black Friday (hereinafter BFCM) is a matter of survival. Below is a step-by-step preparation plan backed by the experience of global and local platforms.

I. 8–12 weeks before BFCM: strategy and planning so you don't miss out on the season

Preparation for Black Friday begins long before the sale starts. If you try to launch everything at the last minute, your website, advertising, and team may not be able to handle the load. Start early — analyze past experience, set goals, and form a clear promotional strategy.

1. Analyze the past year. Collect your store's analytics data for the previous Black Friday/Cyber Monday:

   • which pages generated the most traffic;

   • which products were purchased most often;

   • when sales and load peaked (orders/min);

   • at what stages did users most often abandon their carts.
      

2. This will help you understand where you need to improve your website, logistics, or support before the next sale.
   Use last year's sales data to forecast demand for this season.
   
   For example, BigCommerce recommends forecasting demand based on last year's figures and replenishing stocks of bestsellers in advance.
    

3. Set clear goals and KPIs. Set realistic goals for the BFCM season: for example, increase conversion by +15%, average check by +10%, and return 20% of customers from last year's base, and it will be easier for you to evaluate the success of the promotion after it ends.
    

4. Select products for promotion. After analyzing the data and checking the warehouse, segment the catalog into three groups:
    

   • Best sellers – the most popular products. A minimal discount is enough for them, as demand is already high.

   • Surprise products – items that can be combined into sets or bundles.

   • Warehouse leftovers – products that need to be cleared from the warehouse before the new season. Plan maximum discounts for them.
      

5. Develop a promotional strategy. Decide what types of promotions will work best for your audience. These could be:
    

   • classic percentage discounts (e.g., "20% off everything");

   • bundles and sets;

   • promo codes or discount coupons;

   • exclusive early access for regular customers;

   • post-holiday sales (continuation of promotions after Cyber Monday).
      

Tip: Create an attractive offer that is difficult to refuse. As Shopify notes, many retailers on BFCM offer a "shocking discount" on one popular item to attract traffic, while other items are sold without such a large discount. This works as a loss leader: buyers come for one very profitable product, but end up buying others with a normal profit for you.
 

6. Create a promo calendar. Write down all activities by day and week (you can use Google Sheets, Trello, or another planner):
    

   • dates of email mailings (promotion teaser → early access for VIP customers → main mailing on Black Friday → last day of the sale → post-promotion thank you message);
      

   • launch and peak periods for advertising campaigns;
      

   • website banner updates, promotional content changes;
      

   • checkpoints for reviewing analytics and inventory.
      

Add separate activities for Cyber Monday to the promotional calendar. As BigCommerce notes, Black Friday generates more traffic, while Cyber Monday often yields higher conversion rates and larger average orders. You need to have a plan for both days: use Black Friday to generate interest, and on Cyber Monday, close sales with personalized offers and retargeting.

II. Technical preparation and website scaling: a resilient store without glitches

According to Checkout.com, during Black Friday 2024, global online traffic and transaction volumes increased by tens of percent compared to the previous year. This means that the load on websites in 2025 will be even greater. Technical preparation is a mandatory part of the plan if you don't want your website to crash at the hottest moment. Here is a checklist of key technical steps to take in advance:

1. Conduct load testing.
   
   Test in advance how your website behaves when there is a sudden surge in traffic.
   
   For example, simulate a scenario to understand how to process 5,000 orders per minute at peak sales. Such load testing of an e-commerce platform will help identify weaknesses: in the database, in the shopping cart code, or in the API.
   After testing, increase server capacity and configure auto-scaling of the cloud infrastructure, if supported.
    

2. Optimize page speed.
   
   Site speed directly affects conversion. A slow website loses customers. Optimize your store's speed: compress large images, remove unnecessary scripts, enable page caching.
   
   Use tools such as Google PageSpeed Insights or GTmetrix to check LCP, CLS, and TTFB metrics. Also, consider connecting a CDN to speed up loading for users from different regions. If possible, switch to HTTP/2 and implement lazy loading of images (so that images load gradually). 

Stores on SoloMono are already optimized for high loads: the out-of-the-box system can handle thousands of orders per minute and supports millions of products without losing performance.
 

3. Ensure that your website is mobile-friendly.
   
   According to an analytical review by Red Stag Fulfilment, mobile devices account for 69% of all global online sales during Black Friday and about 70% of sales in the US (2024). Your store should work perfectly on small screens. Check the responsiveness of the design: menus, "Buy" buttons, order forms. Test different devices and browsers. In other words, from the shopping cart to the banners, everything should work equally well on both desktop and mobile devices.
    

4. Check the payment and checkout settings for high traffic and transactions.
   Walk through the user journey yourself: add an item to your cart, proceed to checkout, enter your details, and make a test payment. Make sure that:
    

   • all payment gateways work without failures and accept payments quickly;
      

   • a backup payment option is set up (for example, if the main payment provider fails, there is an alternative method—PayPal, cash on delivery, etc.);
      

   • forms do not display errors when data is entered incorrectly, and the prompts are clear to the user;
      

   • timeouts for payments and external APIs are increased during peak periods (so that the user does not receive an error if the transaction takes a long time to process).
      

In addition, remove unnecessary steps in the checkout process. A simplified checkout reduces the frequency of cart abandonment: the faster and easier it is for a customer to complete a purchase, the better the conversion rate.
 

5. Even top websites experience problems during peak traffic. Think through a plan to reduce risks during Black Friday with a backup plan:
    

   • prepare a "Site under maintenance" placeholder page that automatically activates if the server goes down (it is better if it includes a promise to fix everything quickly and, possibly, a discount promo code for those who visited and found the site unavailable);
      

   • write a queue script for users if there are too many simultaneous visitors — it's better for the customer to wait in a queue with a message than to see an error;
      

   • Regularly back up the database before and during the sale (so that in case of an accident, you can quickly restore all order data).
      

   • Prepare read-only versions of key pages (catalog, contacts) — if the database goes down, users will at least be able to view products and contacts while you restore everything.
      

6. Check the catalog and logistics integration. Before the start of BFCM, make sure that your catalog and warehouse are synchronized automatically. If you use CSV imports, update all products, prices, and balances. Set up backorder rules so that customers can make a purchase even if the product is temporarily out of stock — this will reduce lost sales. Also, contact your delivery services in advance: are they ready for an increase in shipments, and will there be any delays? Logistics integration for Black Friday must work flawlessly — all tracking numbers are automatically sent to customers, and warehouses promptly receive notifications about new orders.
    

7. Enable monitoring and alerts. Set up tools to track your website's performance in real time. Metrics to monitor: server CPU/memory load, page response time, error rate, number of concurrent users, number of successful/unsuccessful transactions per hour. Use services such as Grafana + Prometheus or simpler solutions (even regular health checks with notifications in Slack/Telegram). Set up notification processing programs — for example, if the response time is > 3 seconds or there are more than 1% errors, you will immediately receive an alert. This will allow you to respond to problems instantly (remember, during a sale, "every minute counts"). Also, keep an eye on error logs — any unexpected exceptions should be investigated immediately.
    

III. Preparing the warehouse and team for a large influx of orders

Technical readiness is half the battle. The other half is operational readiness: warehouse, delivery service, support team. You need to make sure in advance that you can deliver on your promises to customers during a surge in orders.

1. Warehouse and inventory.
   Checking inventory before the sale should reveal which hot items may be in short supply — order them from suppliers in advance (remember, suppliers are also busy during this season). Slow-moving items, on the other hand, should be actively sold off to free up space. If a bestseller is still out of stock, set up a notification so that interested customers receive an email when the item becomes available.
    

2. Logistics and delivery.
   Notify your delivery services of the expected surge in shipments. It may be worth arranging for additional daily pickups from the warehouse during the promotion period. Check that you have enough packaging materials—a shortage could slow down shipping.
   
   Consider a backup plan in case the main courier service is overloaded (for example, have the contacts of an alternative service or the option of self-pickup on hand). Logistics integration for Black Friday should include automation: the less manual work, the less chance of error or delay.
    

3. Team and customer support.
   Brief your team before the sales start. During peak times, it is advisable to bring in additional support staff to respond to customers 24/7 as quickly as possible. Therefore, distribute channels and consider implementing a chatbot for the simplest questions to relieve the burden on live operators. But be sure to provide the ability to quickly transfer the customer to a live manager for individual questions.
    

4. Internal communication and operational plan.
   Set up an internal communication channel for the team during BFCM (Slack, Telegram group, etc.), where technical specialists, managers, and leadership will be in touch in real time. If something goes wrong, the information must be instantly available to everyone and the decision must be quick. 

IV. Marketing preparation: how to attract maximum attention (2–6 weeks before the start)

Even the fastest website and the best logistics will not yield results if no one knows about your sale. Therefore, marketing preparation should begin several weeks before Black Friday. Your goal is to make your audience eagerly await your promotions. Here are the main areas of focus:

1. Email campaigns and newsletters. Plan a series of emails that will pique your customers' interest:
    

   • Teaser mailing. 1–2 weeks before the sale, send an email hinting at upcoming discounts ("Something big is coming...").
      

   • Early VIP access. Make an exclusive offer for your regular customers—for example, access to the sale a day before the official start or an additional discount coupon.
      

   • Main mailing on Black Friday. Here, inform all customers about the start of the promotion, highlight the best offers, and add a call to action (limited stock/time).
      

   • Last call. At the end of Black Friday or on Cyber Monday morning, remind customers that the promotion is about to end and this is their last chance.
      

   • Post-sale mailing. Thank those who placed orders, tell them about your other offers, or give them a small coupon for their next purchase (to retain new customers).
      

Be sure to personalize your emails: address the recipient by name, show them products they have viewed or added to their cart before. As Wix advises, divide your subscribers into groups (by interests, past purchases) and prepare a separate message for each group. Also, use eye-catching triggers in the subject line ("-30%," "Secret discount," etc.) to grab attention. And don't forget about language: if your audience is Ukrainian-speaking, prepare a Black Friday email template in Ukrainian — customers will appreciate receiving a letter in their native language.
 

2. Paid advertising and traffic. Two to three weeks before the sale, plan and launch advertising campaigns on the right channels:
    

   • PPC advertising in search engines (Google/Bing). People google "Black Friday [your product]", so make sure your ad finds them. Use ad extensions — they take up more space on the screen and look more convincing.
      

   • Shopping campaigns (Google Shopping). If you have an e-commerce business, product ads with images and prices in search results will bring in warm traffic.
      

   • Advertising on social media (Meta, TikTok, Pinterest). Create attractive banners and videos announcing your discounts. Short videos work well: show products "in action" and add a promotion timer. Use lookalike audiences to find new potential buyers.
      

   • Remarketing. Set up dynamic retargeting (in Facebook Ads Manager or Google Display Network) so that users who visited your site in previous weeks constantly see your reminders about the upcoming sale.
      

3. Organic channels: SEO and content. SEO optimization of promotional pages will help you get free traffic. What to do:
    

   • Create a separate "Black Friday 2025" landing page on your website. Write a description of the promotion, list the product categories, and add FAQs. Optimize this page for keywords: "Black Friday discounts [niche name]," "buy [product] on Black Friday," etc. This will increase the chances that people searching will come across your site.
      

   • Add schema.org markup (e.g., FAQPage, Offer) to this page so that rich snippets are displayed in search engines. This will increase CTR and visibility.
      

   • Update the meta tags (title, description) on the home page and key pages for seasonal keywords (Black Friday, Cyber Monday, sale). But don't overdo it, as most search traffic will still go to a separate promotion page.
      

   • Content marketing. Launch a series of posts on your blog or social media about the upcoming sale. These can be previews of discounts, reviews of bestsellers, top 10 items to buy on Black Friday in your store. Use these materials to warm up your audience and at the same time gather some traffic from Google. 

 

4. Coupons and promo codes. Think in advance about what discount system you will offer and to whom:
    

   • Issue personalized promo codes for different customer segments. For example, NEW20 for new users (-20% on their first order) or VIP30 for your loyal audience (-30% on the entire catalog).
      

   • Limit the validity of coupons by time and number of uses. This will create a sense of exclusivity and urgency.
      

   • Clearly state the conditions: whether the promo code can be combined with discounts on the website; which categories it does not apply to; whether there is a minimum order amount for its use.
      

   • Use tools for mass generation of unique promo codes. This is convenient for email newsletters so that everyone receives their own one-time code (and cannot share it publicly).
      

5. Retargeting and abandoned carts. The reality is that most visitors do not buy on their first visit, and over 70% of carts are abandoned without a purchase. Therefore, be prepared to win back these warm leads:
    

   • Set up a series of automatic email/SMS reminders about abandoned carts. It is desirable that the first letter arrives within 1–2 hours, while the customer's interest is still fresh.
      

   • Launch dynamic remarketing (as mentioned above). Let the user see a banner everywhere with the exact products they were viewing. 

   • Use web push notifications as an additional channel (if users have given their consent). A message on the desktop with the text "You forgot an item in your cart, it's still on sale! Go to complete your purchase" can bring back part of your audience.
      

   • Retargeting analytics. Track what works better — email or SMS, which discount motivates people to make a purchase. Based on this, adjust your strategy during the sale week.
      

V. D-Day: Black Friday/Cyber Monday—your moment to shine

The most important day of the year for e-commerce has arrived. If you have prepared everything correctly, all that remains is to follow your plan. A short checklist of actions for the day of the sale:

• 24/7 monitoring.
  From the early hours of Black Friday until the end of Cyber Monday, keep a close eye on all indicators. Keep your Google Analytics dashboards (in real time), server monitoring panel, and online store admin panel open. Pay attention to unusual spikes or drops. Is there a sudden drop in conversion? Are all transactions going through? If something looks wrong, figure it out immediately without waiting. Real-time analysis will help you respond quickly.

• Communication with customers.
  Ensure the fastest possible response to any inquiries. Ideally, you should have live chat on your website with an online operator available throughout the day. Many questions may also come in on social media — assign someone to monitor direct messages and comments. Keep response templates handy (for typical questions about delivery, warranties, how to apply a promo code, etc.) — this will save time. If a malfunction occurs (for example, the payment service is down for an hour), proactively notify customers on the website and social media, apologize, and assure them that everything will be resolved soon. Your honesty and openness in a crisis situation will maintain loyalty.
   

• Incident management.
  We hope this won't happen, but you need to be prepared. If the website cannot handle the load (it starts to slow down significantly or crash), immediately activate the prepared maintenance/queue mode that we talked about. It is better for the user to see the message "We apologize, the site is undergoing a 15-minute technical break" than just a white page. While the technical team is solving the problem, you can send out an emergency email and post on social media: say, Black Friday is on pause, everyone who is waiting will receive a 5% promo code as an apology. This way, you can even turn the situation to your advantage. As soon as you fix the website, let everyone know that everything is OK and continue selling. How to reduce risks? We have already discussed that it is better to have backup plans for such cases, but on D-day, the main thing is the speed and coordination of the team's actions.
   

• Fraud control (anti-fraud).
  During large online sales, unscrupulous elements such as fraudsters and carders become more active. Therefore, enable all available Black Friday anti-fraud rules for payments: CVV verification, 3D Secure for expensive transactions, limits on the number of payment attempts from a single IP address. Many payment gateways (LiqPay, WayForPay, and others) have built-in scoring systems — make sure they are activated. If you receive suspiciously large orders (for example, a customer ordered 10 expensive items with delivery to a small village after midnight), it is better to contact the customer for confirmation before shipping. Regularly check for anomalies in order amounts.
   

• Maximum sales at every stage.
  On sale days, all tools are good for increasing the average check and conversion. Add product recommendations to the cart ("This product is often bought with..."), upselling offers ("Add another product for $200 for free shipping!"). You can display a small timer on the checkout page that counts down how long the product is available at the promotional price (for example, 10 minutes) — this encourages customers not to delay payment. If the platform allows it, implement one-click purchase for authorized users so that the purchase can be made in one click. All these little things can bring in an additional 5-10% in sales.
   

VI. After the sale (24–72 hours to 1–2 weeks)

You've survived Black Friday and Cyber Monday — congratulations! But the work isn't over yet. Taking the right steps after the sale will help convert one-time buyers into regular customers and lay the groundwork for next year.

• Post-sale communication.
  Send a thank-you letter to all customers who have purchased something. Express your gratitude for their purchase in your store. Add useful information: a link to the parcel tracking page, tips on how to use or care for the purchased product, and support contacts in case of questions. This increases trust — the customer sees that you care about them even after the sale. Add upsell/cross-sell offers: for example, "A tripod would be a great addition to your new camera — here's a 10% coupon for it, valid for 7 days." The main thing is not to stop interacting immediately after receiving payment.
   

• Evaluate the results.
  When the dust has settled and all orders have been shipped, get together with your team and analyze how the promotion went. Compare the actual KPIs with those planned in step I. Summarize the key figures in a short report.

 

• Optimization for the future.
  Based on your conclusions, build a roadmap for improvements. On the technical side: it may be worth switching to a different hosting or CDN, or implementing more sophisticated monitoring. On the marketing side: for example, if email gave great results, focus even more on it next year. If an ad didn't work, review its format or budget. Document all your ideas now, while you still remember the details. In 8–10 months, when preparations for the next Black Friday begin, you can pull up these notes and you'll be ready to go.
   

Finally, take a breath and celebrate the successful completion of the hottest period of the year! It was a difficult marathon, but thanks to your preparation and the coordinated work of your team, you not only achieved record profits, but also strengthened customer trust.