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Did you feel that? Yeah, that's the BFCM Anxiety Aunt knocking on your door this week. Every event, every webinar, every resource is telling you how close BFCM is and that you're never going to be prepared. Give her a big glass of wine and a gummy. You've got this.

CHEERS, BUSHY

01

If you're pulling together last-minute forecasts for BFCM this year, I've got some reports that might help you. Amongst all the doom and gloom, there's more boom. At least… according to these reports.

Adobe has predicted a 6.7% year-on-year revenue increase in the US, with strong growth in furniture, groceries, toys and cosmetics. Shopify's annual global holiday report says 54% of customers feel recent economic conditions have hurt their shopping plans. Yet 84% of Australian retailers (PDF) expect higher sales over the holiday season.

Average spend over the BFCM weekend is expected to grow from $324 last year to $346 this year. But... 69% of shoppers say they don't set a clear budget. Talking about quality, lifespan and bonus loyalty points helped customers spend more. Be the temptress!

Shopify even had the gall to call this “Welcome to the first holiday season of the agentic era”. Hip hip hooray. Let's cut a turkey and raise a glass with our robot overlords. 62% of Australian consumers are likely to use AI for at least one shopping task. The main uses are recommending a product and building a cart. And 29% would let AI make a purchase on their behalf.

And the annual tradition - Australia Post released its Christmas cut-off dates this week. Parcel Post runs from Monday 14 December for the NT routes through to Tuesday 22 December within the same state. It's a big difference between states. You'll get away with the 22nd with Express right across Australia.

02

Shopify Sidekick got its design licence to go with its code licence with the launch of Canvas. Canvas is built to let retailers design the store of their dreams using AI. Design and code work together here. Sidekick can make changes your block settings can't, which is why staff need code access to open it.

It's in early access and only available to certain stores. You'll know you've got it when you see it on your Themes page in Shopify admin. Desktop only, and third-party themes aren't supported. One catch: a theme you edit in Canvas stops getting theme updates. You'll know the people in your team you need to hide this from.

Two other tidbits from Shopify this week. It extended its web MCP to checkout, so browser agents can now go past the storefront and cart and place the order. Users still need to confirm before it goes through. And sadly, Shopify is sunsetting Shopify Academy on 29 October. It was once a requirement to be in the Partner Program. I have strong feelings about platforms being the authority on how to use the product and certifying expert users. I hope it's replaced soon.

03

This week, OpenAI announced visual ads to complement its text ads. These will appear for users on the Free and Go plans while they're generating images. We've seen what happens when humans are allowed to deface bus stop ads. What could go wrong here? Testing starts with US advertisers later this month. Our friends at Triple Whale are one of the new measurement partners so at least someone will be keeping them accountable.

While we're here, ChatGPT now has a feature that lets you try on clothes. Upload a photo of yourself, browse for products you might like, then tap “Try On” in the shopping results to see yourself in the outfit. This could have been very handy for the Bared team as they decked Kylie out for the Grand Final. Founder Anna Baird even flew to the factory in China to escort the boots home. (btw kudos to the team on this win and for sharing a bit behind the scenes.)

04

You've gotta believe me when I say I'm trying not to write about this, but it's relevant to a lot of our readers. Meta has announced Muse for Small Business. We've seen them go after AI to help individuals. Now they're trying to help small business owners. Normally I'd let this pass, but it's the integrations that get me wondering.

It plugs straight into Meta Business Manager, Shopify, Canva, Klaviyo, Slack and Stripe. It's going to make a lot of sense for a lot of small businesses who aren't naturally tech-savvy. Common use cases include sending confirmation reminders for restaurant reservations, building a loyalty programme for valuable customers, finding cheaper suppliers and chasing down unpaid invoices. It's US and Canada only for now, and subscriptions start at US$20 a month. That's less than the credit card surcharge on a cup of coffee.

I liked it better when we were ridiculing Zuck for his metaverse and his creepy glasses.

05

I am particularly pessimistic about the broad brushstrokes of AI above. But I love Pinterest's use of AI. Its new Beauty Guides take hair and nail Pins and translate them into descriptions you can share with your hairdresser, nail tech and more, using terms you may not even understand. Balayage and root melt are a couple that show up in the guide. As a thinning male who can't show photos of Jake Gyllenhaal to his barber with a straight face, this would be very handy.

And if you're in the beauty game, you've got a few treats this week. Our friends at Pattern have released their beauty report. It shows the incredible growth of beauty in Australia, from 5.8% online penetration in 2017 to 24.1% in 2030. That makes it a US$2.2 billion ecommerce category in Australia. They'll also run a webinar on it on Tuesday 13 October if you want to dive deeper.

At the same time, and probably not coincidentally, Pinterest has released its first beauty trend report. It identifies trends coming up in the category, including Farm to Face, Cheeky Flush and Bob Behaviour. I'm not going to explain what they are. You'll have to read the report.

ATC PLAYBOOK #671

Seeding is one of the oldest tactics in retail. So why do so many brands kill it after one campaign?

When seeding moved online, we attached one measure to it. Social coverage. So a campaign goes out, the posts don't come and we write the whole thing off. Meanwhile, a bunch of people have it happily in their hands and are telling others about it in the real world.

In today's Playbook, we pull together four leaders from the ATC archive who've made seeding work in very different categories. We cover three things. Choosing who gets your product by the moment, not the audience. Why a sample doesn't have to be free. And how to be specific about what you're measuring, so you don't kill something that's working behind the scenes.

Examples from this Playbook

🎁 Taryn from #gifted runs product gifting between 11,000 creators and 5,000 brands. She says seeding is worth it even with zero social coverage because the people who try it tell five more at the gym or over lunch.

☕ Jaryd from Before You Speak is eight years in and still handing out coffee at early morning running events.

🧱 Drew from TileCloud charges $15 for five samples posted to your door and about 90% of customers order one before they buy tiles.

🔍 Lauren from Motto Fashions measures the hype through organic search. When people search Miracle Pant instead of just Motto she knows a product is cutting through.