From Afterthought to Powerhouse: How a Bold BFCM Strategy Supercharged Adrianna Papell's Seasonal Sales

Background and Challenge

Adrianna Papell is a renowned fashion brand celebrated for its timeless elegance and dedication to crafting beautifully designed, high-quality apparel. Founded in 1979, the brand specializes in women's occasion wear, including evening gowns, cocktail dresses, and bridal attire, as well as versatile daywear and separates. The brand's mission is to make every woman feel special and confident, offering inclusive sizing and a wide range of styles that cater to diverse body types, tastes, and occasions.

Historically, Adrianna Papell treated Black Friday and Cyber Monday as routine promotions rather than capitalizing on them as the biggest sales events of the year. In the previous year, the sale offer was lackluster, and the advertising efforts were modest at best. Given that BFCM can significantly influence annual revenue, the brand, along with our team, sought a fresh approach this year.

The objective was twofold:

       Increase overall revenue compared to the previous year.

       Leverage the BFCM period to secure as much revenue as possible, using improved promotions and a significantly enhanced        advertising strategy.

Strategic Approach

Early Preparation

At the start of November, far before the BFCM window, we initiated robust new customer acquisition efforts. The rationale was simple: building a large, high-intent audience pool early would enable more effective retargeting once the sales hit. By the time Thanksgiving arrived, our campaigns were already “warmed up” with elevated conversion rates, ensuring that when the promotional offers went live, we could quickly scale and convert at a higher rate.

Platform-Specific Tactics

Google Ads:

Seasonality Adjustments: We applied a seasonality bid adjustment, allowing our campaigns to anticipate a spike in traffic and allocate spend efficiently.

BFCM Asset Groups & Ad Creatives: Each Performance Max campaign—one for each of the five major product categories—received a dedicated BFCM-focused asset group. These groups contained specialized ad copy, holiday-themed creatives, and strategic sitelinks and promotion extensions.

Merchant Center Promotion: We activated a promotion within the merchant center, adding strike-through pricing to enhance product listing ads and signal strong value to potential customers.

Meta Ads (Facebook & Instagram):

Advantage+ Campaign Transformation: We converted one of our top Advantage+ campaigns into a dedicated BFCM campaign, ensuring a substantial portion of spend was directed toward showcasing seasonal creatives to a broad but high-converting audience.

Messaging Refresh: Our best-performing pre-existing ads were updated with BFCM messaging. By overlaying the sale narrative onto proven ads, we heightened relevance and conversion likelihood without needing to reinvent the wheel creatively.

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Criteo:

Dynamic Display & Native Ad Coupons: We placed BFCM coupons across all Criteo placements to ensure that every dynamic display and native ad reinforced the sale messaging and incentives.

Ads Platform Results and Metrics

Overall Business Impact

Beyond the ad-attributed metrics, the total business performance (including all channels and site-wide sales) also showed significant improvement. The enhanced strategies and compelling BFCM promotions had a ripple effect across all customer touchpoints.

Key Insights

Start Early for Better Results: By building a warm audience before the sale, we were able to convert more efficiently during the promotion period.

Platform-Specific Customization: Tailoring messaging, creatives, and bidding strategies per platform (Google, Meta, Criteo) allowed each channel to perform at its best.

Compelling Promotions Matter: Unlike last year’s weak sale offer, this year’s aggressive and clearly communicated discounting strategy drove a significant uplift in conversions.

Treat BFCM as the Major Event It Is, Not Just Another Sale: Allocating sufficient resources and attention to BFCM can fundamentally change revenue trajectory during this critical shopping period.

By transforming our BFCM strategy—starting earlier, leveraging platform-specific tactics, and delivering a more compelling promotional offer—we dramatically improved performance. The results speak for themselves: higher revenue, more conversions, and improved efficiency compared to the prior year. This case exemplifies how a focused, integrated, and bold approach to Black Friday and Cyber Monday campaigns can unlock substantial growth opportunities.

Ad-Driven Outcomes

Black Friday revenue increased by 123.60%, with spend up by 47.72%.

Cyber Monday revenue rose by 36.69% on a 84.70% increase in spend.

Total revenue jumped by 77.04% YoY, while spend increased by 64.51%, translating to a moderate but still positive ROAS lift of +7.62%.