The Cyber Five, also known as the Turkey Five, has become a defining moment for retailers across every commercial industry. Despite the efforts these businesses put into prepping for this time of year, many of them put too much focus on the wrong preparations.
While advice about starting early and managing inventory dominates the conversation, these strategies alone are no longer enough. With retail sales expected to grow 2.7–3.7 percent in 2025, totaling up to $5.48 trillion, the stakes and opportunities have never been higher. To help you make sure your business is ready, this guide will help you position yourself for a successful Cyber Five week by focusing on some of the more overlooked yet critical areas that ensure you stay ahead of the competition.
Why the Cyber Five of 2025 Requires a New Approach
Like every preceding year, the 2025 holiday season will present unique challenges and opportunities for businesses. This year includes 28 shopping days between Thanksgiving and Christmas, giving consumers an extra day to browse and buy compared to 2024. Meanwhile, mobile commerce continues to dominate, projected to reach $4.01 trillion and accounting for 59 percent of ecommerce sales globally. That means smartphones now drive 77 percent of retail site traffic and 68 percent of online orders.
Despite this, many businesses are still planning as if it were 2021, relying on outdated assumptions shaped by inventory shortages and cheap advertising traffic. With supply chain improvements reducing inventory volatility and platforms continuously evolving, success in 2025 demands a shift in strategy.
Strategic Breakdown of the Cyber Five
Each day of the Cyber Five offers distinct opportunities, but treating them as merely discount-driven events is a missed opportunity. Here’s how businesses can make each day count.
Thanksgiving Day
Thanksgiving is an ideal day for soft launches and early-bird offers. Instead of focusing solely on discounts, try to leverage storytelling that connects customers with your brand’s values and incorporates themes of gratitude. Position yourself as more than a retailer—present commonalities that resonate with your customers’ holiday traditions.
Black Friday
No matter what, Black Friday will still be the big day for most businesses; the landscape is fiercely competitive, so you need to find ways to stand out. Take this day to execute omnichannel strategies, with a strong emphasis on mobile-first experiences. Leverage your website, apps, and physical stores (if applicable), ensuring a seamless customer experience across all touchpoints. While you likely want to go big on Black Friday, don’t make it the crux of your strategy. You still have three more days to fully utilize, and diversifying your efforts can yield better long-term results.
Small Business Saturday
This often-overlooked day is packed with potential, particularly for brands open to capitalizing on the “shop small” sentiment. Community-focused messaging and partnerships with local organizations can set your business apart. Even if you don’t fall under the traditional “small business” category, crafting campaigns that support community-building can capture loyalty and sales.
Sales Sunday
There’s not really an official term for Sunday—some refer to it as Sofa Sunday—but Sales Sunday is more fitting. This is the day that many of your previous efforts come to fruition. Maybe someone saw your Black Friday deal but was too busy to act on it that day. No matter the reason, for many people, Sunday is the day they can finally sit down and shop. While you don’t need to work on any new angles or promotions for this day, sending a friendly reminder email or crossposting about your ongoing sale could be the push an interested consumer needs to become a full-fledged customer.
Cyber Monday
To wrap things up, we have Cyber Monday. This day has evolved, and treating it as Black Friday’s digital sibling is outdated. Personalization, user-generated content (UGC), and mobile-first creative should define your approach. Stagger your offers to give this day its unique relevance while creating an elevated digital shopping experience. Then be sure they have some staying power since many of these sales continue throughout the following week.
Preparing Beyond the Basics
Effective preparation for the Cyber Five requires pushing your business beyond simple inventory management. You need to take things to the next level. To ensure you get the best results possible, here’s a look at what many businesses miss in their strategy.
Creative Diversification
Investing in diverse advertising creative presentations is essential for reaching various audience segments effectively. Sticking with one content format is a problem that occurs even outside of the Cyber Five. In fact, it’s one of the most costly ad mistakes companies make on Meta.
To avoid this issue, you must recognize that different types of content resonate with different groups. If you rely solely on one format or style, you’ll limit your potential impact. To succeed, your campaigns should include a variety such as eye-catching static ads, engaging video content, credible customer testimonials, and authentic UGC.
Since so much holiday shopping now occurs on smartphones, you’ll want to be sure to prioritize mobile-optimized formats. For example, use short and direct 15-second video ads for platforms like TikTok or Instagram Stories alongside carousel ads that highlight product features on Facebook. Tailored creativity ensures your messages are delivered compellingly, regardless of the platform.
Brands also need to shift from standard approaches to campaign-specific creatives that align with real-time shopping trends during the Cyber Five. Allocating time and budget to A/B testing creative elements beforehand can drastically improve your campaigns.
Leveraging Algorithms
Ad platforms today are powered by algorithms that excel when advertisers provide the right environment to work within. Yet many businesses still micromanage targeting, reducing the potential efficiency of platform recommendations.
A more innovative approach involves balancing broad targeting with tighter creative constraints. Instead of hyper-specific audiences, equip algorithms with versatile performance-based creatives and clear campaign objectives. This allows the platforms to identify new opportunities across untapped audiences without unnecessary restrictions.
Additionally, lean into predictive analytics features offered by major platforms like Meta Advantage+ or Google’s Performance Max campaigns. These tools extend your reach by automating high-performing ad placements, freeing your advertising team to focus on strategy rather than fine-tuning every facet.
Attribution and Measurement
Accurate tracking has never been more critical in today’s privacy-conscious landscape. The introduction of iOS updates and restrictions on data sharing means businesses must rethink their reliance on old models of attribution.
Establishing a multi-touch attribution plan allows for analysis of all customer interaction points during the buyer’s journey. This framework gives a clearer picture of how each marketing effort contributes to conversions and helps optimize for the most impactful channels.
Creating realistic ROAS benchmarks is another essential component of the Cyber Five readiness. Instead of focusing purely on upfront profitability, factor in the overall lifetime value of newly acquired customers. Many holiday shoppers are purchasing from a brand for the first time, offering valuable long-term growth potential.
Budgeting for Flexibility
Once you have your core strategy set, one of the most critical adjustments businesses must make during the Cyber Five week is to move away from rigid budget limits. Fixed forecasts often fail during a high-stakes retail season where market dynamics change rapidly. Operating a flexible budget system ensures you can capitalize on emerging trends and opportunities as they arise.
For instance, if a particular creative outperforms projections on Black Friday, a flexible budget lets you boost spending to maximize returns. Conversely, if early Cyber Monday campaigns are under-delivering, you can reallocate ad spend toward platforms or offers that are performing better.
Another consideration is platform diversification. While Google and Meta remain juggernauts of digital advertising, allocating a portion of your budget to emergent media like TikTok or other more experimental channels could pay off. These platforms often provide cost-efficient opportunities for capturing younger, mobile-first audiences.
Finally, aim for a balance between holiday-period ROAS and overarching goals for customer acquisition. Sacrificing some short-term margins to build first-party data or expand your email subscriber list lays the groundwork for growth beyond the Cyber Five.
Executing in Real-Time
The Cyber Five’s success hinges on dynamic execution. Planning is critical, but real-time monitoring ensures strategies convert effectively when applied in-market. Develop clear plans for hour-by-hour campaign oversight and empower your teams to make decisions swiftly.
This real-time responsiveness involves analyzing campaign performance metrics like cost-per-click (CPC), click-through-rate (CTR), and ROAS daily—even hourly in some cases. When a specific strategy doesn’t meet expectations, pivot instantly. A strong command center approach, with dedicated personnel monitoring ads during peak hours, ensures you’ve maximized your opportunities and diminished your risks.
Consider adopting automation tools that enable quick scaling of budgets or pausing of underperforming campaigns without manual intervention. Custom notifications on ad spend thresholds, CPC increases, and ROAS drops ensure no blind spots exist in case of market shifts during the peak Cyber Five moments.
Just remember, though, that the concept of “set and forget” can be particularly dangerous, especially in 2025’s unpredictable landscape. Real-time agility and strategic attention will increasingly define winners during the most competitive week on the retail calendar.
Redefining the Cyber Five Success
Even though sales and success typically go hand-in-hand, true success during the Cyber Five is about more than that. To succeed here, businesses need to place a focus on larger objectives like market share acquisition, customer engagement, and long-term revenue growth.
Key metrics to monitor include traffic volume, new customer signups, and social media interactions, as they offer critical insights into how well your brand resonates with shoppers. A Cyber Five campaign that gains a new audience can sustainably drive business growth for months to come.
Additionally, remember that customer acquisition during the Cyber Five is an investment, not just in single purchases but in forming relationships. Through email marketing, postpurchase communication, and loyalty programs, you can turn first-time buyers into repeat customers or advocates for your brand.
Knowing When To Look for Outside Assistance
With the right balance of preparation, flexibility, and execution, the Cyber Five can be the launchpad for both your holiday success and your long-term growth ambitions. However, tackling this on your own is easier said than done. Not every company has the resources to take full advantage of each portion of the Cyber Five. That doesn’t mean you should just accept defeat and take whatever sales you can get.
Instead, look for a partner who can help you prepare for an explosive extended Thanksgiving weekend. In this case, Logical Position could be that partner. Our team offers a variety of social media marketing services as well as email and SEO campaign support strategies, all of which are structured to maximize visibility and conversion opportunities during 2025’s Cyber Five.
