| 1

Inspire

| 2

| 3

| 4

Gift Guides are a helpful tool for shoppers who are looking for ideas and they present

a good opportunity for publishers to capture the attention of shoppers with seasonal

content. With gift guides now common, consumers are increasingly seeking them out.

‘Gift guide’ searches last Christmas were 43% higher than in 2014 and they’re likely to

be even bigger this year. Gift guide searches typically begin to rise as early as the first

week of November, but they reach their peak the first full week after Cyber Monday

(week commencing 5 December this year) after the first round of purchases is done

and shoppers begin running out of ideas. Hitwise clients can track trending gift guide

searches by adding this report to your dashboard.

Shoppers love click and collect for the convenience and they’re only becoming more

enamored with the concept. Searches for ‘click and collect’ last December were up a

relative 17% compared with the year before, so make sure your click and collect

program is getting commensurate attention. Click and collect searches really pick up

about two weeks before Christmas Day and continue to rise sharply through the 22nd.

Click and collect activities drop sharply on Christmas Eve and further on Christmas

Day before returning to pre-seasonal levels on Boxing Day.

| 5

Online shipping and package tracking peaked last year on the 22nd of December as

nervous gift givers are frantically trying to find out if their purchases are going to arrive

in time. Interestingly, Tuesdays were the peak day each week for package tracking

throughout the season. Make sure to provide easy links and constant updates to

reassure customers that things are under control.

Christmas jumper day. This year, Christmas Jumper day is on the 15 December and

online searches are expected to peak on this day. Last year we saw that Star Wars

jumpers—Darth Vader ones in particular—were among the most popular as were

those featuring images from Drake’s Hotline Bling video and Die Hard. Add this report

to your dashboard to track this season’s trends.

Last minute shoppers often buy gift cards and vouchers, and as electronic gift options

become the norm, these searches become even more last minute. Peak gift card

activity occurs on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Traditionally, searches for gift

‘vouchers’ peak on Christmas Eve (which makes sense given that they’re normally

purchased in a shop), but gift ‘card’ searches peak on Christmas Day. On Christmas

Day, there is also a surge in activity of consumers seeking to check gift card balances

as well as ‘exchange,’ ‘trade’ or ‘swap’ cards.

Christmas Day is when all those gadgets people received as gifts will come to life.

They’ll be busy downloading driver software, apps and more to make the most of their

gifts. In fact, searches including the keywords ‘download’ and ‘activate’ were 37%

higher on Christmas Day last year than they were a week prior.

| 6

| 7

| 8

| 9

| 10

| 11