Retailers see traffic, sales spike during Mayhem event

Heather McIlvaine

24th May 2017

Over 200 retail brands participated in Click Frenzy’s Mayhem event last week, slashing prices on thousands of products during the 24-hour online sale, which kicked off at 7pm AEST on 15 May. 

Among them was Melbourne-based marketplace MyDeal, which offered discounts across a variety of categories with the goal of attracting a larger audience.

MyDeal founder and CEO Sean Senvirtne said the move was a success.

“Click Frenzy sales have always exceeded our expectations, and we were very happy with the results this year,” he told Internet Retailing.

According to Senvirtne, the marketplace completed nearly 6,000 transactions during the online event, compared to the 464 it sees on average on a typical day.

“Click Frenzy events are real time, and highly measurable which is the beautiful thing. It’s high conversion traffic as [consumers] have the intent to find bargains and are prompted to act due to the time limit,” he said.

Senvirtne cited new email signups, brand awareness, the ability to attract a larger audience and the opportunity to rapidly grow its customer base as the main benefits of participating.

Click Frenzy first launched in 2012 as Australia’s answer to Cyber Monday in the US.

While the once-yearly sale on the third Tuesday of November remains the main event, organisers in 2015 added the Mayhem sale to boost online shopping during a traditionally quiet period for retail.

“The interest [in Mayhem] has been much higher than we expected,” Click Frenzy founder Grant Arnott told Internet Retailing. 

“This year saw volumes of traffic and clicks on par with what we saw during Click Frenzy in [November] 2015.”

With deals such as a 65-inch LG television on sale for $25, Mayhem reportedly drove 1.3 million Australians to participating retailers’ websites.

Such high levels of consumer participation weren’t always a good thing in the past.

The first Click Frenzy made headlines for all the wrong reasons, when technical problems caused servers to crash and left some shoppers disappointed.

But more recent events have gone smoothly, with both Click Frenzy organisers and participating retailers better prepared.

According to Arnott, many repeat retailers plan their Click Frenzy or Mayhem strategy over six months in advance, making the sale a part of their overall business plan.

Social media and content manager at My Pet Warehouse Alana Rosso told Internet Retailing that communicating with all stakeholders well ahead of the event is crucial.

“We alerted all the key stakeholders and let them know from the get-go what our offer was and how it would affect dispatch.

“We made sure we had plenty of staff working in our warehouses, customer service team and data operations. We’ve learnt from the past,” Rosso said.  

My Pet Warehouse offered shoppers a ‘buy one, get one free’ deal last week in an effort to reach new customers, resulting in a “big spike” in sales, according to Rosso.

Commenting on the effectiveness of targeted reductions compared to site-wide discounts, Arnott said it’s more important what retailers do after the event.

“The smart retailers see it as an opportunity to acquire new customers,” he said.

“They’re prepared to take a hit on margins to turn those one-time customers into lifetime customers. That takes good communication and over delivering [on your offer].”

Retailers that participate in Click Frenzy and Mayhem pay a fee based on their position on the website – premium positions on the ‘front page’ cost more – as well as a cost per click, which varies depending on their overall ad spend.

A version of this story first appeared in Inside Retail Weekly, issue 2141. To subscribe, click here.