The 2026 selling season is about to look very different. We’re at peak adoption of consumers using LLMs, like ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini, and Perplexity, to shop. Because of this, the consumer journey and path to conversion are now more complex. The trust consumers place in LLM responses to their shopping prompts is surprisingly high, with most shoppers relying entirely on the AI to shape the decision all the way to purchase. 

95% of shoppers who get a product recommendation from an LLM won’t visit a brand or retailer website to verify it. Among 18–27 year olds, 64% buy on the recommendation alone.

Twelve months ago, most brands were still focused on ranking in traditional search results. Consumer shopping behavior has changed more in the last 12 months than in the previous five years combined. That shift is going to define how every peak event plays out in 2026. 

Amazon and Walmart are blocking LLMs from crawling their product data. So, keeping consumers within the Amazon ecosystem to maximize Prime Day returns and overall conversions is critical. 52% of all U.S. consumers still begin their online product searches directly on Amazon,^¹ which is reassuring for Prime Day activity. But when we factor in the LLM component, our strategy to maximize Prime returns gets more nuanced. 

Previously, we wouldn’t have as heavily considered our clients’ .com websites as part of the Prime Day journey, but if LLM recommendations are relying on Google and other general product data feeds, then ensuring product data hygiene from those outside sources is critical. 

How should brands reach shoppers on Amazon and LLMs at the same time?

• For consumers already starting their journey in Amazon search, keep them engaged, targeted with appropriate content and ads, and slam dunk the conversion. 
• For consumers starting their search in LLMs, make sure client .com product data feeds are accurate, updated, and organized so the right recommendations entice consumers to seek out the shopping moment outside the LLM. 

There’s more to this year’s approach. Prime Day lands June 23–26 this year, the earliest window since 2021 and the second year at four full days.¹

Back-to-school demand is already overlapping with it. BFCM is less than six months out. And the LLMs shoppers are using to find and compare products have improved significantly since last peak season.

LLMs are pulling richer product details, making more accurate comparisons, and starting to support transactions directly. The brands and retailers who will perform best during peak 2026 are the ones whose catalogs are accurate, structured, and available everywhere the AI is looking. 

At Rithum, we work across 900+ channels with brands and retailers preparing for these events right now. We’re deep in the planning alongside them, from media strategy to product data to channel prioritization, and everything below reflects what we’re seeing and recommending heading into peak selling in 2026. 

What are the major 2026 peak sales events, and when do they happen? 

• Amazon Prime Day: June 23–26¹ 
• Back-to-school: May through September (peaks during and after Prime Day) 
• Labor Day: September 1 
• Amazon Prime Big Deal Days: October (dates TBD; October 7–8 in 2025) 
• Singles’ Day: November 11 
• Black Friday: November 27 
• Cyber Monday: November 30 

Beyond the timeline, two things connect every event on this list: AI is reshaping how shoppers discover products, and the brands with accurate, structured data across channels will capture more demand than those without it. 

How should brands prepare for Amazon Prime Day in June 2026? 

Prime Day runs June 23–26 across 35 categories, with deals dropping three times daily and new inventory going live every five minutes during peak hours.¹ Amazon is putting particular emphasis on fresh groceries and household essentials, building on 4 billion grocery and essentials items delivered via same-day delivery over the past year.² 

Last year’s Prime Day (July 8–11) generated $24.1 billion in U.S. online spend, up 30.3% year over year.³ Four of the top five items sold were household or grocery products.⁴ School supplies rose 175% and dorm essentials 84%.³

Across our own client base, the four-day format shifted buying patterns. Shoppers browsed Days 1 and 2, then converted late, with Day 4 GMV jumping 38% year over year. 

One Rithum client pivoted mid-event to back-to-school bundles and optimized product titles on Day 2. That shift drove a 15% sales lift over the prior year. The teams that adjusted in real time outperformed the ones that set a plan and left it. And that was before AI was deeply embedded in the Prime Day experience. 

What role does Alexa AI play in Prime Day 2026? 

This year, Alexa for Shopping (formerly Rufus) will sit directly in the Amazon search bar, search results, and product detail pages for every U.S. customer.¹ Amazon has told sellers that Alexa pulls from listing content to answer shopper questions and make recommendations. If your product attributes are incomplete, Alexa will recommend someone else’s.

During Prime Day 2025, shoppers who engaged Rufus were 60% more likely to complete a purchase. Alexa now helps shoppers build personalized deal guides, set price alerts, trigger auto-buy at target prices, and review 365-day price history. Every one of those features pulls from your product data. If your titles, descriptions, and images aren’t accurate, you’re not showing up in those conversations. 

Rithum’s retail media advertising connects spend to product performance across Amazon, Walmart, and Target so you can shift budgets while the event is live. Marketplace listings keep data accurate across 900+ channels so you can coordinate pricing, inventory, and promotions across Amazon and every channel competing for the same shopper during Prime Day. And inventory management prevents oversells and stockouts during the exact hours demand spikes. 

How does AI shopping change peak season strategy in 2026? 

When AI gets product information wrong, 58% of shoppers lose trust in the brand itself, not the AI tool that served it. And shoppers aren’t loyal to a single AI platform either: ChatGPT’s daily active user share has fallen steadily since early 2025, Gemini has more than doubled its share in the same period, and 20% of AI users now regularly use two or more chatbot apps. Brands that only optimize for one platform are leaving reach on the table. 

The shopping capabilities on these platforms have also matured. Perplexity offers one-click checkout through Buy with Pro and PayPal integration across thousands of merchants. Gemini supports agentic checkout through Google Pay, including auto-buy when a price target is met.

ChatGPT launched native shopping features in late 2025. These are live commerce channels, and every one of them relies on structured product data to generate accurate recommendations. 

We built ChatGPT and Perplexity Feeds for this: product data compiled, optimized for LLMs, and delivered for ingestion so your brand controls how it appears in AI recommendations. Our upcoming GEO (generative engine optimization) pilot provides a way to track how products appear, move, and compare within AI-driven results. Rithum and Stripe are also building the commerce infrastructure for transactions that happen inside the AI conversation itself. 

The path from catalog accuracy to LLM delivery to in-conversation purchase is what determines whether your products get recommended during peak season. Every step depends on the one before it, and most brands are still missing at least one. 

How early does back-to-school shopping start in 2026, and what should sellers prioritize? 

Back-to-school retail is projected at $85.42 billion in 2026, up 3.3% year over year.⁵ 67% of families started buying by early July 2025, up from 55% the year before. With Prime Day now in June and school supplies already among its top-performing categories (up 175% during Prime Day 2025³), back-to-school effectively starts during Prime Day. 

84% of parents say prices are too high. 82% are prioritizing value over brand. But 80% still say buying the specific products their child wants is important.⁵ Parents are cutting back on clothing and switching to store brands in some categories while spending full price in others. Brands that understand which of their products fall into which bucket can plan promotions accordingly. 

We recommend spreading promotions across May through September rather than concentrating spend in a single burst. Rithum’s product catalog feeds push near-real-time updates to price, stock, and product data across every channel where shoppers and AI agents are looking. For brands selling across multiple regions, automatic localization for language, currency, and regional specs keeps listings accurate without rebuilding feeds from scratch. 

What should brands plan for across Q4 2026 peak events? 

September through November packs five major sales events into 90 days, and performance in each one can help shape the strategy for the next. 

Labor Day (September 1) — The last major sales moment before Q4 takes over.

Brands use it to move seasonal stock in a smart way. They set pricing rules based on demand signals, not flat markdowns. This helps them carry less dead stock into the holiday rush.

Rithum automates promotional updates across marketplaces. Order management routes to the best fulfillment location based on your rules. 

Prime Big Deal Days (October) — Amazon’s separate October event, distinct from summer Prime Day.

The 2025 event (October 7–8) outperformed the prior year globally.³ Shoppers complete holiday purchases here, and the performance data directly informs Q4 decisions. Brands that connected product feeds to LLM platforms earlier in the year will have compounding advantages by October.

Singles’ Day (November 11) — $202 billion across major Chinese platforms in 2024, making it the largest single shopping event globally.³

The event continues to expand into Southeast Asia, where Chinese ecommerce players now account for up to 50% of B2C GMV in key markets. U.S. and European retailers saw an 11% year-over-year lift in influenced revenue last November. Rithum supports 600+ global marketplaces with built-in localization and dedicated account strategists across EU, US, and APAC. 

How should brands prepare for Black Friday and Cyber Monday 2026? 

Black Friday (November 27) and Cyber Monday (November 30) — BFCM 2024 delivered $10.8 billion (Black Friday) and a record $14.3 billion (Cyber Monday 2025).³

Promotions started climbing November 16 last year, nearly two weeks early. Mobile drove 56% of online holiday spend last season.³ AI-assisted shopping volume, which surged during Prime Day 2025, will be even higher by November as more consumers adopt LLM-based product discovery. 

During BFCM 2025, we advised clients to spread budgets from October through December. Clients increased spending by only 3% on average and still hit efficiency goals with a 1.7 advertising cost of sales. Here’s how those Prime Day lessons apply to holiday planning. 

Across all of these events, the operational requirements are the same: accurate product data everywhere you sell, budgets that can move in real time, and listings that don’t break under pressure. Rithum’s product catalog feeds deliver data to every channel and AI platform in the right format. Paid search and shopping ads optimize across Google, Microsoft, and Meta with feed-level precision. And marketplace listings catches broken or non-compliant listings before they cost you revenue during the highest-traffic weeks of the year. 

How do you prepare for peak season across 900+ channels at once? 

Our 2026 Commerce Readiness Index found that 43% of retailers and 37% of brands are prioritizing AI enablement across operations. The best teams have one thing in common at their busiest times. Product data, ad spend, inventory, and fulfillment all run in a single connected system. When something changes mid-event, they can act right away. 

Rithum brings all of that into one platform across 900+ channels and AI platforms. If you’re planning for peak 2026 and want to talk through your approach, our team is here. 

Footnotes
¹ Amazon Press Release, “Mark Your Calendars: Amazon Announces Prime Day Event from June 23–26,” June 2026. press.aboutamazon.com
² Forbes, “Amazon Prime Day 2026 Moves to June—This Time With Alexa AI Powering the Cart,” June 2026. forbes.com
³ Adobe Analytics, various reports including “Prime Day Event Drove $24 Billion in Online Spend Across U.S. Retailers” (July 2025), Black Friday 2024, Cyber Monday 2025, holiday season 2025, and Singles’ Day data. business.adobe.com
⁴ Numerator, “Amazon Prime Day 2025 First Half Results,” July 2025
⁵ MRI-Simmons, “Back-to-School Shopping Trends of the 2026 Season,” May 2026. mrisimmons.com | Accio, “Back-to-School Trends 2026.” accio.com

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During peak season, more than $1.5B in Cyber 5 sales moved through Rithum across channels, regions, and categories. That’s the first wave. The second arrives after the shipping notifications stop: returns season. Calendars reset, staffing normalizes, and inventory shifts back toward warehouses. For the shopper, the decision often happened earlier—at checkout, when they relied on whatever the product page made clear and whatever it didn’t. 

And as shopping shifts from product pages to AI agents that summarize and recommend, returns get harder to manage. When an agent gives the highlights, shoppers may never scan the full product detail page (PDP), compare specs side by side, or catch details that prevent a mismatch. If the summary is wrong, the purchase can still go through, and the retailer still absorbs the return. The harder part is accountability and diagnosis. If shoppers never see the original product page, you lose the trail of what they were told and you can’t easily trace a return back to a missing detail, a bad summary, or a mismatched listing. 

How can you prepare for returns season? Use January to audit the promises you made during peak: which products were misunderstood, which channels dropped key details, and which fixes would have prevented repeat returns. 

What returns show 

In the U.S., online returns will top $363B, driven by a 24.5% return rate, according to Rithum’s 2025 global returns & profit impact report.  

Rithum’s consumer research shows the same drivers repeating: 61% cite poor fit and over a third say the item didn’t match the description or photos. 

Fit plays out differently by category. The “didn’t match” driver applies across categories. 

Electronics returns can trace back to compatibility or what was included. Home returns follow scale and finish. Parts and industrial returns surface around fitment, specifications, or installation assumptions. Across categories, the same thing happens: unclear listings leave customers to guess. 

In January, returns cluster. The same products come back through the same channels for the same missing details. In a Rithum returns fireside chat featuring Fabian Ortmann, Head of Returns, ZEOS; Kevin Brown, Director, Sales and Strategic Partnerships, Essendant Fulfillment Services; and Louis Camassa, Director of Product, Rithum, Ortmann argued that returns should be treated as a data source, not just a cost center, one of the clearest ways to pinpoint where expectations broke by product, channel, and market. 

That framing changes how brands and retailers should use January. For returns season, the work should shift from cleanup to finding out what went wrong. 

Where channel listings diverge 

Channel differences start costing money in January. During peak, products are listed, reformatted, and rewritten to fit each marketplace’s format. That’s expected. The risk is what gets lost. 

One channel may carry a compatibility field. Another may not. One listing spells out what’s included, while another assumes it’s obvious. One channel enforces short titles that drop (important) qualifiers where another keeps them in tact.  

Louis described this in the fireside chat: when listings leave room for interpretation, customers answer the question themselves. Sometimes they guess right. Sometimes they don’t and that can lead to a higher rate of returns. 

Why timing changes the math 

Returns also don’t happen on your schedule. In the same conversation, Essendant’s Kevin Brown described the gap between decision and action. Customers often decide quickly whether they’re keeping something. The return itself may take weeks to arrive. 

That delay narrows options. Inventory comes back later. Resale windows shrink. Seasonal goods lose flexibility. The cost isn’t only the refund. It’s what the business can no longer do with the product. 

January is also when slow fixes compound. If product information is inconsistent across channels and updates move slowly, the same mismatch keeps shipping while teams debate which version of the truth is “correct.” 

Rithum’s 2026 commerce readiness index points to why this is common. 91% of retailers and 78% of brands report poor data quality. Nearly 75% say inaccurate data leads to bad decisions. 

When product records aren’t consistent or trustworthy, January becomes more triage than correction. 

What policy can and can’t do 

Return policy shapes demand, but it doesn’t explain repeat returns. Policy still matters because shoppers read it before they buy, especially when they’re unsure. 

Rithum’s research shows return policies influence 41% of purchase decisions, 88% expect free returns, and 47% won’t click “buy” without them. 

Most preventable returns aren’t caused by policy. They’re caused by uncertainty that existed before policy mattered. 

What to check first 

Start with the returns that teach you something. Look at SKUs that return quickly after delivery. Fast returns tend to signal expectation breaks, not end-of-season cleanouts. 

Compare the same SKU across your top channels. Don’t assume it matches your internal record. Check titles, key attributes, images, what’s-included language, and variants. 

Track “didn’t match description/photos” returns by channel. Rithum found that 33% of shoppers cite mismatch with the description or photos as a reason for returns. 

Then move from insight to change quickly. If updates take weeks to reach every listing, the same mismatch keeps shipping. 

Where AI fits 

AI won’t fix messy product data. The eTail report’s preparedness finding reinforces the same issue returns already expose: only 2% of organizations describe themselves as fully prepared with structured product feeds and governance. 

Rithum’s 2026 commerce readiness index shows how widespread the gap still is: 91% of retailers and 78% of brands report poor data quality, and nearly 75% say inaccurate data leads to bad decisions.  

Whether the buyer is human, a marketplace algorithm, or an emerging shopping interface, the requirement doesn’t change. Product truth has to be consistent, category-appropriate, and fast to update. AI will move decisions faster, but it will also scale whatever your data gets wrong. 

What to do next 

The goal is to reduce the avoidable ones and recover value faster on the rest. 

The brands and retailers who do this well don’t wait for the next peak. They use January to tighten product truth, align it across channels, and push corrections while the signal is still fresh. Learn how Rithum can help.

Jordan Christensen is Director, Client Experience, Retailers at Rithum. 

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Rithum is where 41.5K+ brands, suppliers, and retailers connect to 600+ global channels every day. More than $1.5B flowed through our platform in the five days from Thanksgiving to Cyber Monday alone.  

During those biggest shopping days of the year, we helped clients navigate real-time changes in shopper behavior, channel performance, and category mix. Here are the deepest shifts we tracked in holiday buying behavior—and the moves you can make now to stay ahead of them.

Shift 1: Social selling surges 152% 

On Black Friday, shopper spend through social channels more than doubled compared to 2024: social-driven sales were up 152% year-over-year on Black Friday and up 140% year-over-year on Thanksgiving Day. 

And it wasn’t just impulse buys or viral gadgets. Ceiling lights and extension cords were moving just as fast as the usual social-friendly products. Shoppers are increasingly comfortable having their whole journey—from discovery to checkout—inside creator-led environments. 

In terms of categories: 

• Clothing, Shoes & Accessories took the top spot. 

• Home & Garden outpaced long-time social favorite Health & Beauty. 

• “Unsexy” categories like Business & Industrial and Parts & Accessories also ranked among the top sellers—beating out classic gift areas like Sporting Goods, Toys & Hobbies, Musical Instruments & Gear, Music, and Books. 

The new flagship store is your customer’s couch. Shoppers bought almost as much on Thanksgiving Day as on Black Friday. Post-Turkey, living room scrolls are now a peak shopping moment.  

If you haven’t turned on social yet as a channel, now is the time to jump in. We saw one client grow their total GMV 227% year-over-year during the Cyber 5, and most of that revenue growth was due to social selling—even though social was a channel they turned on less than 6 months ago.  

Shift 2: Is Pre-Turkey-Tuesday the new Black Friday? 

Black Friday keeps stretching longer and longer, and what used to be a day is now multiple day long events. Across key marketplaces, a cluster of early Black Friday events generated 36% more revenue than the actual Black Friday-day sales.  

A few standout patterns*: 

• In one case, an early Black Friday event actually beat Black Friday itself, driving 58% more sales than the main day. 

• When you add up the three days leading into Black Friday (including Thanksgiving), they generated about three-quarters more sales than Black Friday alone. 

• The Tuesday before Thanksgiving was a standout: for marketplaces running multi-day events, that single day drove almost two-thirds of Black Friday’s volume on its own. 

This isn’t necessarily a surprise: we’ve seen sales pull forward into a longer window for the past few years, just like Prime Day has shifted from a single-day spike to multi-day, multi-period promotions that competitors pile onto. Black Friday is now just one chapter in a much longer promotional book.  

What we are always evaluating is how well various peak approaches work for our clients. The big question here is, Do early Black Friday deals cannibalize the event, or do shoppers still show up?   

This year, the extended runway paid off. But it can be a balancing act. Earlier sales give shoppers more time to research and respond to competing offers. Consumers know they can take a few more days to compare sales, and that those sales will be more aggressive. This intensifying competition in turn forces you to be more selective about where you place promotional dollars, as every click costs more.  

But so far, the risk of longer Black Friday window (and resulting higher competition) seems to pay off well. The key is to treat it as a precision exercise in staying agile to changing demands and not just a longer period of blanket discounting.  

Shift 3: UK sales up 27%; EMEA up 25% year-over-year   

Black Friday went global a long time ago, but shoppers and sales behave differently everywhere. In EMEA, promotions are still more tightly concentrated than in North America, with the one-day-Black-Friday itself carrying an outsized share of demand. Across our network, Black Friday sales revenue in the UK grew 27% year-over-year and EMEA grew roughly 25% year-over-year. In contrast, 2025 EMEA Cyber Monday delivered a much more modest 4% growth over 2024. In EMEA at least, it seems that the big bang Black Friday event is still very much a thing, even as the U.S. shifts toward a more dispersed “Cyber Month” pattern. 

Local regulations, cultural shopping habits, and varying levels of marketplace maturity all shape how and when shoppers buy. The lesson from 2025 early holiday sales is that brands and retailers operating across borders can’t simply copy-paste a U.S.-style playbook and expect consistent results. They need to calibrate timing, discount depth, and channel mix to local expectations, and plan around regional peaks rather than a single, globally synchronized event. 

Strategy, data, and agility will always beat sheer scale 

Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and the Cyber 5 are still big moments. But the real story is how they now sit inside an always-on, experiment-driven, home-centered era of commerce. The clients we see getting the best bang-for-their-Black-Friday-buck treat this season as part of a continuous learning journey. They go into peak with clear hypotheses and guardrails, then evaluate spend ruthlessly, adjust in real time, and stay agile on everything from channel mix to creative to discount depth.  

In this competitive ecommerce world, where every click is more expensive and every event moves faster than the last, you can’t just show up with the loudest promotions. You need a partner who can help you learn fast and move faster.  If you want to test smarter, react quicker, and squeeze more out of every peak, let’s talk about how we can help. 

*these numbers come from select marketplaces that ran multiple Black Friday events 

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Summary: Holiday 2025 ecommerce strategy

• Data readiness is uneven. Nearly 3 in 4 retailers and brands say they’re making decisions on incomplete or inaccurate data. Retailers more often act within 48 hours when signals spike, while more brands take 3 to 5 days. 
• Shopper timing has shifted. As covered in our recent webinar, during summer sales season carts were built early and many purchases landed on day 2 to day 4. 
• Where conversion happens is evolving. Social commerce is the top current conversion driver, with site experience close behind. Think live shopping, influencer unboxings, and social-first storytelling that leads directly to purchase. 
• Returns impact profit. 60% of shoppers made at least one return last year. Average processing cost is about $30 per returns. U.S. online returns are projected above $363B; globally, returns account for roughly 17% of sales value. 
• Policy influences purchase. 41% say return policies affect the decision, 88% prioritize free returns, and 47% have stopped buying from a retailer or brand due to policy. 
• Two case notes. Monitoring hourly and leaning back in late improved AOV and conversion by the end of a four-day event. An apparel brand’s mid-event pivot to seasonal assortments, bundles, and cleaner titles delivered a 15% lift over the prior year. 

Shoppers plan early and purchase later

The competing big sales events of July, September, and October have given us an outline of the shape of things to come for holiday season just around the corner. The big themes? Shoppers are planning early and often building carts early then buying late. In our recent webinar, Countdown to holiday 2025: Strategies for growth and agility, experts Kellie Martin, Nistaar Chandhok, and Storm Morgan summed up a new pattern of shopper behavior: “Shoppers were browsing less and buying more deliberately. Cart building happened early, but conversion often didn’t occur until day two or four.” 

The earlier cart building points to the competition of today’s sales season, and the ease of comparison shopping across big sales (especially when shoppers are aided by AI). While early cart building is slowing down the path to purchase, it also gives you longer windows to act on your live sales data—the key is getting the right information quickly, understanding the patterns, and knowing when to change course during a sale (and when to stay steady).  

The 2026 commerce readiness index shows that commerce leaders report uneven data quality and response speed, which matters when promotions land and search behavior shifts.  

Here are some scenarios to help you plan around that pause and move based on what you see as part of your holiday 2025 ecommerce strategy.

Path A: Improve visibility 7 to 10 days before the peak window for your holiday 2025 ecommerce strategy

If data shows you that your discoverability is weak, begin here. The webinar tied early launches to stronger CTR and lower CPC. “You can’t win if you show up late,” Storm said. 

• First, match real searches. Tune product titles and keywords to seasonal queries across the marketplaces and channels you sell through, including your site and social shops. 
• Next, strengthen the product page. Use enhanced product pages with clear bullets and consistent value messaging so comparison shoppers can decide quickly. 
• Then, add early creator content. The webinar highlighted authentic influencer campaigns that show the product in use as a lift when paired with strong product pages. 

Watch CTR, CPC, PDP views, and add to cart. If carts grow but orders land later, go to Path B. If traffic remains thin, stay on Path A and keep improving titles, images, and keywords. 

Path B: Convert day-2 to day-4 buyers without deep discounts 

If carts are building while buyers compare, lean into the timing covered in the webinar. More than a third of shoppers price-check across sites before they commit. 

• First, show value rather than cutting deeper. Bundled offers and loyalty programs lifted average order value in the examples that Storm discussed in the webinar, without the cost of blanket discounts. 
• Next, keep it current. Update titles, keywords, and product page copy to match trending queries and seasonal context during the event. 
• Then, find ready-to-buy-shoppers. AI-driven formats like Google Demand Gen and Performance Max helped when the message was specific to winning new customers. 

Track day-2 and day-4 conversion, AOV, and cart resume rate. If the margin tightens, go to Path C. If traffic softens, return to Path A. 

Path C: Protect margin with value and channel fit 

If revenue grows while profit slips, use the levers shown in the readiness index and webinar. 

• First, tap into pricing agility. Dynamic pricing helped retailers and brands respond to competitors’ moves in real time without broad cuts. 
• Next, set the products and price for each channel. Multichannel shopping is normal. Set assortment and pricing strategy to each channel’s strengths. In the holiday readiness webinar, Storm noted that buyers will pay full price when value is clear, especially for scarce items or well-timed bundles. 
• Then, watch results hour by hour. Rithum saw clients who watched SKUs and profit hour by hour and adjusted as needed. 

If returns start to rise or policy questions distract buyers, move to Path D. 

Path D: Reduce the cost of returns while keeping trust 

Returns are the swing variable in Q4. The 2025 Global Returns & Profit Impact Report quantifies what drives them and what stops them. 

• First, fix issues before purchase. 60% of consumers made at least one return last year. Poor fit is the top driver in apparel at 61%, and about a third of shoppers returned because items did not match descriptions or photos. Clear sizing, accurate copy, and strong images reduce avoidable returns. 
• Next, set clear policies that compete. 41% of consumers say return policies influence purchase, 88% prioritize free returns, and 47% have stopped shopping with a retailer or brand due to policy. If you change terms, make them easy to understand and consistent. 
• Then, plan for common behaviors. Bracketing is a common habit by 36% of global shoppers and over half among shoppers under 35. Two-thirds used third-party drop-off to return at least once in the last 12 months. 51% consider 14 days or less a reasonable window, with higher acceptance of shorter returns windows in some European markets. Understand some of the key levers to lower returns, and lean in.  

Keep an eye on total cost data. The average processing cost is about $30 per return. U.S. online returns are projected above $363B in 2025. 

If operations are steady and you want more demand, go to Path E. 

Path E: Adjust live and capture after-event demand 

If mid-event performance wobbles or you want to extend gains, follow the measured moves shared by Rithum’s experts during the holiday readiness webinar. 

• First, decide with hourly signals. One retailer started slow, held budget, watched hourly, and leaned back in; by the end, AOV and conversion improved, said Storm. 
• Next, pivot toward what is trending. An apparel brand shifted to back-to-school assortments, introduced bundles, and tightened titles and keywords, finishing 15% above the prior year’s Prime event. Per Nistaar: “They were pretty happy with that.” 
• Then, keep campaigns live after the rush. After-event demand is real; in October, we even saw some spending surge higher the day after an event ended than during the first day of the event. Test urgency messaging and retarget saved carts with offers that match the week’s story. 

If visibility still lags, return to Path A. If carts build again and buyers wait until later in the window, go back to Path B. 

Regional notes to localize any path 

If you sell in multiple regions, tune the plan to what shoppers actually do there. In Europe, shoppers compare across Amazon and regional marketplaces like Otto or Allegro, which means titles, keywords, and offers should reference local norms and events. In APAC, Singles Day and other game-like promotions drive activity, so timing and creative should match those mechanics and calendars. In North America, shoppers react strongly to fast delivery promises and a smooth checkout, so make shipping dates and returns information easy to see on the product page. Use these differences to pick which path to start with and which levers to pull first. 

Quick map for retailers and brands 

• If you are not being seen, use Path A. 
• If carts are full and buyers wait, use Path B. 
• If margin is slipping, use Path C. 
• If returns threaten profit, use Path D. 
• If performance is uneven mid-event or you want the tail-end lift, use Path E. 

Start where you are, switch when signals change, and keep each move tied to your data. 

If you’re ready to turn these paths into results, learn how Rithum can help.

Storm Morgan is a Senior Technical Account Manager at Rithum. 

Sources: The 2026 commerce readiness index, Global returns & profit impact report, Countdown to holiday 2025: strategies for growth and agility webinar 

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October’s Amazon Big Deal Days, flanked by rival events at Target and Walmart, confirms that for today’s shoppers, extreme sales operate as planning windows more than purchase windows. Billions still move through carts, but before they click purchase, consumers are comparing prices, checking delivery windows, and weighing return policies—and with the help of agentic AI, they can do it all without even visiting the retailer’s website. 

Most of all, they seem to be waiting. Many of the highest GMV days took place after the sales window. What does that mean for Black Friday, and the rest of the holiday season?

What we learned from October 2025 

Walmart opened its October event to everyone (with a head start for Walmart+), and Target deepened member-led offers. This broad access framed the holiday season’s opening moves.  Amazon buyers focused on everyday essentials with 58% saying they were satisfied with the deals, 23% saying they already purchased gifts, and 84% plan to buy holiday items on Amazon in the next three months. October sales, in other words, were the first round of the peak holiday shopping season, with shoppers starting early, but planning on more shopping to do. This is another sign that shoppers aren’t responding to urgency-driven hype the way they used to. They’re shopping on their own terms, watching closely, waiting longer, and buying based on intent, not impulse. 

Shoppers plan, retailers widen the window, and mobile and agentic AI set the terms. Here are some of the biggest patterns we saw in October’s sales push:. 

• Demand is real, but disciplined. Forecasts call for a sizable holiday spend, driven by mobile and a fast increase in AI-assisted shopping traffic, up 520% year over year. Shoppers are doing more research in less time. 

• Access beats exclusivity. Walmart’s “no membership required” positioning and Target’s member perks ran in parallel with Amazon’s event, giving shoppers many options  rather than anchoring them to one singular price drop  

• October is a staging ground. Reuters and Adobe flag October’s Amazon event as a multi-billion-dollar catalyst that pulls forward  holiday spend without exhausting demands. The shopping that started with October sales is expected to stretch longer, not be done earlier. 

• Category mix matters. Numerator’s early read shows baskets heavy on household essentials alongside selective gifting. Consumers are being mindful about what they spend. 

Shoppers are comparing across channels, pacing their purchases, and prioritizing convenience and trust. They check prices, delivery windows, and return policies before they buy. With Rithum, that behavior works in your favor: pricing, promises, and product details stay consistent across every touchpoint. Your returns policy doesn’t change from one channel to the next. And when the market shifts, you shift with it—because Rithum connects marketplace data, retail media, and fulfillment in real time. One update moves across platforms, so you can reallocate spend or inventory seamlessly.

Holiday 2025 retail strategy: next steps

Adobe expects U.S. online holiday spend to reach $253.4B, with mobile driving a majority share (56.1%) and buy now, pay later (BNPL) adding another $20.2B—evidence that convenience and flexibility, not just markdowns, will shape conversion. 

October sales set the tone for the season. Now is the time to stay consistent and make sure you’re keeping the same price, promise, and product facts everywhere. Push what is already selling and remove the friction that shoppers flagged. Start here: 

• Plan promotions around what shoppers actually want at different times, instead of relying on the same event-driven discounts.  

• Adjust product mixes and creative in real time to highlight what’s trending or to support categories that need a lift.  

• Connect messaging and offers across marketplaces, retail media, and owned channels so shoppers get a consistent experience wherever they buy. (Most teams are already shifting where they show up: 91% of retail leaders and 84% of brands changed their marketing channel mix in the last year.) 

• Use first-party data to personalize offers and reduce dependence on paid ads.  

• Measure success by long-term value don’t focus on short-term sales spikes. Repeat customers, lifetime spend, and loyalty are the your better long-term value drivers..  

• Partner with marketplaces and vendors to build limited-time experiences that create excitement and reach new audiences.  

• Re-engage peak-season buyers after the event with thoughtful follow-ups that turn one-time shoppers into loyal customers.  

• Put delivery dates and a clean returns promise on the page. Return policies are a decision filter at scale. 41% say the returns policy influences where they buy — so make the promise visible and easy to use. 

October shows that the 2025 shopper is steady, selective, and ready to buy when the facts are clear. Keep the same price, promise, and product story everywhere, make the mobile experience flawless, and turn returns into trust. To see how Rithum connects your marketplaces, media, and fulfillment so you can act on this now, contact Rithum to learn more. 

The post How October’s big sales set the stage for holiday 2025  appeared first on Rithum.

How does Gem Stone King keep up with more than 300,000 SKUs listed on Amazon, Walmart, eBay, its own direct-to-consumer (D2C) website and other channels during peak selling for Valentine’s Day? By using Rithum.

“As we’ve prepared for the busy Valentine’s Day season, Rithum’s platform has been an essential tool, ensuring our product listings remain accurate and up to date across multiple sales channels,” said Gem Stone King E-Commerce PPC Manager Andrew Molchan.

Rithum provides support when consumer demand spikes during peak sales periods

Gem Stone King is managing a vast catalog across multiple marketplaces. Pivoting during the fast-paced sales event is the difference between conversions and empty carts.

“The ability to push quick updates, adjust listings, and maintain pricing consistency across multiple platforms is critical during this time. Since consumer demand spikes during Valentine’s Day, we can’t afford to have outdated product information or stock inaccuracies.”

– Andrew Molchan, E-Commerce PPC Manager, Gem Stone King

A curated collection and positive customer experience for Valentine’s Day

Gem Stone King has the flexibility to curate collections for Valentine’s Day. Top-selling products include sophisticated gold and platinum jewelry, as well as lab-grown diamond jewelry, heart-shaped designs and stones. Consumers can also customize pieces with their birthstones or add custom engravings.

Rithum enables Gem Stone King to create customized product feeds tailored to each marketplace channel’s specific requirements. Powerful reporting tools provide valuable insights into performance trends, enabling the brand to make data-driven decisions and spot trends followed by reallocating resources to support those fluctuations in demand.

“Over the last year, we’ve seen a huge improvement in how we manage our multichannel selling strategy and listings. The integrations with marketplaces have been significantly enhanced, allowing us to manage listings more efficiently,” Molchan said.

Reach more Valentine’s Day shoppers through retail media ads

Brands and retailers using Rithum can adjust for content optimization and assist with advertising to reach consumers across the multiple sales channels they are shopping. Sponsored ad placements allow consumers to engage with brands and products, allowing advertisers to tell their story directly. According to Walmart first-party data, marketplace sellers who advertise with sponsored ads see, on average, $4 in attributed product sales for every $1 of ad spend.* Compared to non-ad exposed customers, those exposed to a brand’s Walmart Connect ads were 6x more likely, on average, to buy brand items.**

For more insights into how Rithum can help you elevate your multichannel selling strategy and ensure smooth operations during peak selling events, contact our team and schedule a demo today.

The post How Gem Stone King Manages 300,000+ SKUs Across Multiple Marketplaces for Valentine’s Day appeared first on Rithum.

Maximize peak holiday moments with TikTok Shop

Cyber Five, the five days between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday, continues to be a pivotal moment for sellers to impact their bottom lines. These key dates offer unmatched opportunities for brands and retailers to gain traction, drive sales and build lasting momentum for the holiday season.

TikTok Shop makes it easier for shoppers to explore products, make purchases and stay engaged – all in one place. In fact, 62% of TikTok users take part in social e-commerce activities on a weekly basis. They are also 1.5 times more likely to purchase after immediately discovering a product on the platform. With Rithum’s TikTok Shop integration, sellers can capture and engage a diverse audience. This can turn views into revenue and followers into longtime customers.

TikTok Shop offers brands and retailers:

• More high-quality traffic: Visibility on purchases improves algorithms to optimize traffic for conversions.
• Expanded visibility: Track real-time performance, traffic, customer reviews and transaction data through TikTok Shop’s analytics dashboards.
• Creator collaboration at scale: Get access to TikTok Shop’s Affiliate Program. It enables sellers to partner with creators and easily grow their business.
• Real-time interaction: Leverage the power of live shopping streams to speak directly with viewers and answer their questions to build trust and interest.

Rithum customers grow on TikTok Shop

In 2023, online retailer Book & Mortar Record Store, LLC began selling directly on TikTok Shop but quickly faced challenges managing its extensive inventory. With thousands of products to list, the store owners were tediously tasked with manually filling out product attribute fields for every SKU, tracking stock levels and mapping out suppliers. This process became cumbersome, costing time and potential sales. An unexpected “viral” surge for a famous artist’s vinyl album led to overselling. The business turned to Rithum to automate selling in TikTok Shop. In the first month of using Rithum, the one retailer’s sales jumped by over 250% from the previous month and grew to 694% by November 2023.

Crazy Dog T-Shirts, a US-based seller of novelty apparel and accessories, manages its product catalog through Rithum. In 2024, the brand engaged TikTok’s Affiliate Program. As a result, received record-breaking sales through the social platform’s network of influencers. One of its t-shirts achieved “Hero Product” status, ranking among the top 30 listings based on sales on TikTok Shop.

TikTok Shop’s Holiday Checklist: A step-by-step guide

To help sellers thrive during the busiest shopping season of the year, TikTok Shop has created a Holiday Checklist. Here’s how to make the most of the platform during Black Friday and Cyber Monday with Rithum:

1. Get started: Sellers can begin by setting up a TikTok Shop account. Then by adding the channel to their Rithum platform account. To sell through TikTok Shop with Rithum, sellers must register their business and have warehouses located in the United States or the United Kingdom.
2. Manage inventory: To avoid overselling or stockouts, Rithum’s automated inventory management helps sellers synchronize inventory quantities across channels to avoid overselling or stockouts. Paired with TikTok’s Analytics Dashboard, sellers can forecast demand and keep up with what shoppers are searching for and buying through the channel.
3. Optimize product listings: Sellers are encouraged to create engaging product descriptions and high-quality visuals to capture audience attention in a crowded space. Rithum can help transform and optimize product data and automate feed delivery by adapting and automating product data to match every channel, so product listings stay consistent and accurate on TikTok Shop and beyond.
4. Connect TikTok Shop to e-commerce platforms: Seamless integration between a seller’s social channel and their existing e-commerce platform is fundamental for managing orders, inventory and product listings. Rithum connects all channels to one unified platform. This makes it easier to manage operations during the holiday rush.
5. Collaborate with creators: One of TikTok Shop’s greatest strengths is its thriving community of over 100,000 creators ready to promote the products they love. With Rithum, sellers can gain access to TikTok Shop’s Affiliate Program to easily partner with creators and grow their business.

Ready to make this holiday season your most successful yet?

Get started selling on TikTok. Learn more about leveraging Rithum’s TikTok Shop integration. Use it to tackle peak shopping days like Black Friday and Cyber Monday with confidence.

The post How to Thrive During Cyber 5 and the Holidays with TikTok Shop appeared first on Rithum.

Significant growth for key categories

According to some experts, purchase behavior shifted from the first day of the Amazon Prime Day sale to the second, initially starting with a surge in shopping for household essentials and grocery items. This was attributed to the higher cost of daily goods and more budget-conscious shoppers spending less during the first day of the event. The second day saw more purchases in higher value categories like electronics. These were attributed to the merchant’s heavy promotions toward Amazon’s own electronic brand offerings.

Prime day historically has been a top event for specific category growth on a national and global level. This October’s event further reinforced that trend, according to Digital Commerce 360. Specific categories of note were:

• 36% growth for electronics
• 36% growth for general apparel
• 21% growth for health and beauty

These categories are consistently high performers year after year, especially as the brand and product competition within each category continues to increase. We also expect social commerce to sell well in these categories through social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram this holiday season.

Millennial shopper trends

The millennial shopper has been the highest spending demographic group in previous Amazon Prime events. However, this demographic’s purchase power has declined. The rationale for their reduced spending could be that they are savvy shoppers and therefore take more energy from advertisers and retailers alike to gain trust and establish creditability. While deals can be attractive to these consumers, they rely more heavily on their peers for reviews and word of mouth creditability. As this will be a continued expectation of this generational shopper, it is advised that brands and sellers incorporate story telling into their overall campaigns and messaging to target millennial consumers in future.

Retail media campaign ad type trends

As retail media continues to grow and rely on first-party (1P) audiences for reach and efficiency, it is no surprise that activity within Amazon DSP (demand-side platform) experienced an increase in advertising spending and activity during Prime Day events. Coupling Amazon DSP and AMC (Amazon Marketing Cloud) is a compelling strategy for maximizing ad spend while leveraging the most targeted audiences during sales events. Concurrently, sponsored product and sponsored brand ads saw an increase in advertiser spend but performed less efficiently or received fewer clicks. Brands will continue to diversify campaigns within a retailer ecosystem to maximize reach and exposure.

Applying Prime Day seller strategy to peak season and Cyber 5

With the increased pressure to maximize sales during Prime Days, brands and retailers need to focus on what will serve them best during these high traffic days. During the holiday peak season, sellers can combine refreshed page optimization with product prioritization based on “digital share of shelf” data such as the amount of competitors in the category or the amount of reach a campaign has had.

During peak selling, there is more emphasis on boosting budgets. But it is important to remember that prioritization of products remains a key component of sales strategy.

Retailers and brands use promotions to attract consumers

While Amazon hosts two of the largest e-commerce sales each year, other retailers are deploying their own sales strategies to compete. Walmart hosted a June members-only weekly long sale, quickly followed by a July sale directly competing with the first of the two annual Amazon Prime sales events. Target held Target Circle week from July 7-July 13. Other niche retailers such as Petco, Chewy and others also lowered some prices in a price match effort while Prime events run to offer shoppers compelling discounts. We expect a similar strategy during the holiday shopping season.

Shoppers are comparison price shopping online. 83% of global consumers will visit two or more websites before buying, according to the 2023 Online Consumer Behavior Global Report by Rithum and research firm Dynata.

Apply lessons from Amazon Prime Days in real-time

Rithum’s centralized dashboard provides brands and retailers with a view of operations to track and synchronize fulfillment, inventory and orders across multiple channels. Features like Rithum’s repricer automation, performance monitoring, stock alerts, order routing and management, shipping integration, and returns management help sellers avoid errors on marketplace listings.

For retail media, Rithum’s team creates custom reports that provide data-driven insights. It uses campaign monitoring data, which contains thousands of campaigns, to help achieve optimal performance as well as help prevent incorrect bids or ad pauses. Holiday readiness reports help brands identify what worked during peak events like Amazon Prime Days and what needs improvement before the holiday rush. Rithum’s actionable insights show sellers what to consider when refining strategy for holiday shopping as well as make changes during Black Friday and Cyber Monday peak selling days.

Learn how Rithum’s integrated commerce solution can help you navigate the holiday shopping season on marketplaces by scheduling a demo today.

Meghan Barden is director of global retail media at Rithum.

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