Part of our MindMeld series, this study reviews Black Friday posts from the following retailers: Walmart, Target, Toys 'R Us, JCPenney, Kmart, Sears, Nordstrom, Best Buy, Costco and Sam's Club. We collected public conversation from across Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, forums, blogs, and other news media to analyze the sentiment for each retailer and the overall shopping experience. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: Black Friday mentions peaked at 11am CST for all retailers, as shoppers got into the full swing of the experience, and were sharing what they had discovered from the morning doorbusters. Walmart led retailers studied all day in both Volume and Share of Voice, but saw negative posts outweigh positive more than 4 to 1. Target, JCPenney, Sears and Nordstrom led positive sentiment for retailers, with many of these statements directly about the deals being offered. Kitschy commercials may be backfiring for K-Mart and JCPenney, as these were the primary drivers of their negative conversation sentiment. Fighting was a significant theme of conversation, but with 96% of these mentions driven by Walmart, this story entirely rested on the shoulders of that brand. You can read more about this story on Forbes.com, here: http://www.forbes.com/sites/markfidelman/2013/12/01/ranked-by-ibm-and-mutualmind-black-friday-winners-and-losers/

1. MindMeld Report:
Black Friday 2013
www.mutualmind.com
For more information about
MutualMind or this study,
contact us at:
info@mutualmind.com

2. Executive Summary
• Black Friday mentions peaked at 11am CST for all retailers, as
shoppers got into the full swing of the experience, and were
sharing what they had discovered from the morning
doorbusters.
• Walmart led retailers studied all day in both Volume and
Share of Voice, but saw negative posts outweigh positive
more than 4 to 1.
• Target, JCPenney, Sears and Nordstrom led positive sentiment
for retailers, with many of these statements directly about
the deals being offered.
• Kitschy commercials may be backfiring for K-Mart and
JCPenney, as these were the primary drivers of their negative
conversation sentiment.
• Fighting was a significant theme of conversation, but with
96% of these mentions driven by Walmart, this story entirely
rested on the shoulders of that brand.
2
Company Confidential
2

3. Introduction & Scope
Black Friday has become an unparalleled retail event, and
as digital marketers have matured, brands have layered
increasing levels social marketing and monitoring on the
holiday every year.
This year, MutualMind wanted to take a high-level
overview of how this marketing trend has continued. To do
so, we collected public digital conversations for the
following retailers:
•
•
•
•
Walmart
Target
Toys ‘R Us
JCPenney
•
•
•
•
K-Mart
Sears
Nordstrom
Best Buy
• Costco
• Sam’s Club
3
Company Confidential
3

4. Study Design
• For each retailer, we gathered brand mentions using a
reasonable set of name variants, based on our previous
research. For example, Nordstrom was represented as:
(nordstrom OR #nordstrom OR @Nordstrom OR
nordstroms OR #nordstroms)
• We also applied a filter for Black Friday mentions only (using
an AND Boolean clause), identifying the following keywords:
(“black friday" OR blackfriday OR #blackfriday)
• While this design does potentially exclude relevant mentions
related to the event that simply don’t mention Black Friday
literally, it gives us a clear focus of study and only captures
conversations with explicit topical focus.
4
Company Confidential
4

5. Overview
• There were 69,795 mentions
captured for 11/29, peaking
at a volume of 5,071
mentions per hour at 11am
CST. Twitter has previously
stated they see an average of
5,700 tweets per second
worldwide, so this is a
significant volume of traffic.
• Volume was heavily focused
on Twitter (93% of total), as
would be expected during an
event when consumers are
primarily using mobile
devices. Blogs came in at 3%,
with Facebook and News
sources tied at 2%.
5
Company Confidential
5

6. Overview
Total Sentiment
Total Mentions by Retailer
Costco
1%
Best Buy
1%
Sam's Club
0%
JC Penney
1%
Kmart
1%
Nordstrom
1%
Sears
1%
Toys R Us
2%
Target
13%
Walmart
79%
6
Company Confidential
6

7. Retailer Breakdown
Walmart Dominance Consistent Throughout
• As expected of the largest
company in the U.S.,
Walmart led volume of
mentions for the entire day,
cresting with 4,416 mentions
at 11am CST, and again with
3,676 mentions at 4pm CST.
• While volume was more
dynamic for Walmart, Share
of Voice was practically
uncontested for the day.
Walmart held an average
SOV of 77.5%, with Target
the next closest at an
average SOV of 13.5%.
7
Company Confidential
7

8. Sentiment Analysis: Walmart
Overwhelming Negativity Driven by Fights
• The negative sentiment
spikes at 11am CST for
Walmart, then decreases
again. Conversations revolve
around fighting, the strikers
and the employee who was
trampled by the rushing
crowd.
• Walmart's positive
sentiment remains relatively
stable throughout the day,
although greatly
overshadowed by negative
stories – almost 4 to 1.
8
Company Confidential
8

9. Sentiment Analysis: Target
Balanced Sentiment Throughout the Day
• Target’s negative sentiment
peaks at 12pm CST, driven
by the article The Worst of
Black Friday: Guns, Knives
and Brawls released at 11
am and was shared several
times during the following
hour.
• While negative sentiment
was significant, positive
statements also followed
suit, driving an extremely
balanced opinion overall –
much more so than for
Walmart.
9
Company Confidential
9

10. Sentiment Analysis: Toys R’ Us
Viral Tweet Spikes Negative Sentiment
• Negative sentiment for
Toys R’ Us peaked at
11am CST with a snarky
tweet going viral, but no
strong brand damaging
sentiments.
• Positive sentiment also
followed, albeit not as
much as for Target. Good
news for the brand: most
positive statements were
directly about the deals
offered.
Company Confidential
10
10

11. Sentiment Analysis: JCPenney
Positive About Deals, Negative for Commercials
• JCPenney saw a strong
level of positive
sentiment throughout the
day, albeit at erratic levels
due to the low overall
volume of mentions.
• Negative sentiment
focused strongly on the
latest round of Black
Friday commercials from
the retailer, meaning
these may be backfiring
instead of driving
commerce.
Company Confidential
11
11

12. Sentiment Analysis: Kmart
Commercials Showing a Marked Negative Effect
• Negative sentiment was
consistent throughout the
day, primarily focused
around the Black Friday
commercials from this
retailer. Many wished Black
Friday would be over so
they wouldn’t air.
• Positive sentiment was
extremely deal driven,
particularly by this press
release from Savings.com
citing Kmart’s 70% off
doorbusters as one of its
top 20 deals for Black Friday
online shopping.
Company Confidential
12
12

13. Sentiment Analysis: Sears
Positive Conversations from Successful Press
• Sears enjoyed a strong level
of positive mentions, driven
primarily by a release
published on Black Friday:
“Sears Reports
Thanksgiving, Black Friday
Trends and Insights.” The
informative nature of this
content made it more useful
than typical self-serving
brand messages, and thus
found widespread sharing.
• Negative sentiment was
primarily attributable to a
viral hoax that “42 million
were killed over Black
Friday” that mentioned
Sears among other retailers.
Company Confidential
13
13

14. Sentiment Analysis: Nordstrom
Viral Mentions Outside the Brand Drive Sentiment
• Positive sentiment for the
brand is somewhat
inadvertent, as they were
mentioned in a release from
PandaCashBack.com that was
shared frequently. More
organic positive sentiment was
about the shopping experience
of Nordstrom in general.
• Negative sentiment spiked
around a frequently-shared
tweet from the band One
Direction, and wasn’t
materially related to the brand.
In fact, direct and material
negative sentiment about
Nordstrom was extremely low
throughout the day.
Company Confidential
14
14

15. Sentiment Analysis: Best Buy
Erratic at the Edges, But Predominantly Neutral
• Mentions of the
electronics retailer were
predominantly neutral –
in fact, this retailer had
the most neutral
mentions of all in our
study.
• While minimal, positive
and negative mentions
were impassioned – most
often about the in-store
experience, which may
have had inconsistent
quality.
Company Confidential
15
15

16. Sentiment Analysis: Costco
Limited Mentions Overall; Positive Deal Mentions
• Mentions for Costco were
extremely limited,
especially so when
compared to other
retailers – only 1% of the
total volume for this
study.
• Positive mentions were
primarily driven by dealfinder sites, as Costco had
a number of attractive
price points on clothing;
electronics.
Company Confidential
16
16

17. Sentiment Analysis: Sam’s Club
Extremely Limited, But Extremely Positive
• Sam’s Club was essentially
silent as a brand during
Black Friday, and posted
the fewest social
mentions of any retailer
in our study for the day.
• However, CNET gave
them a huge boost in a
sweepstakes for an LG
home theater system
from the retailer posted
that morning.
Company Confidential
17
17

18. Deeper Dive: Fighting
Walmart Mentions Lead this Damaging Theme
•
•
•
Company Confidential
With customers rushing to get the
best deals and retailers having a
limited amount of inventory, it’s not
unusual to hear about fights that
break out on Black Friday. We used
our post collection filters, to search
for all mentions of “fight”, “fought”
or “fighting.”
Walmart led conversations regarding
fights with 96% of all mentions
within this search – in fact, this
represented over 10% of all
Walmart mentions, and nearly 25%
of their negative sentiment.
“#WalmartFights” even showed up
in our topic cloud for this query,
demonstrating the frequency and
ubiquity of these mentions.
18
18

19. Deeper Dive: Commercials
Strong Negative Sentiment for Retailer Ads
• Post-collection filters were
used here to identify
conversations mentioning any
of our studied retailers + Black
Friday + “commercial OR
commercials”.
• Sentiment for retailer ads
during Black Friday was
extremely negative, with 53%
of all mentions expressing
disapproval.
• Walmart again led this
category, but much less clearly
– Kmart, Target and JCPenney
each received a significant
volume of mentions in this
vein.
Company Confidential
19
19

20. About MutualMind
Want to reach us? Info@mutualmind.com
•
•
•
•
Company Confidential
Founded in 2009; based in Addison, TX
SaaS enterprise platform for collecting, analyzing
and responding to social interactions
Unique architecture built from the ground up for
integration with OEM partners via whitelabel or
our “fly-by-wire” API
Proprietary IP for social shopper and commerce
analytics (patents filed)
Analytics and Response
Management workbench with
intuitive, free-form
segmentation and integrated
sentiment analysis
Real-time visualization of social
conversations for the big screen
with drag-and-drop editor and
rapid-deployment secure
launcher
20