Deloitte is forecasting 2026 holiday sales growth of 4.0% to 4.8%, with online sales up 7.5% to 8.4%. That sets up a familiar retail squeeze: shoppers are switching brands and using promotions to control spending. For CRM owners, the counter-move is not another blast—it’s a recency ladder.
Why recency is the strongest CRM signal
RFM scoring has been around for decades, but recency is the strongest predictor of a repeat purchase. The more recently someone bought from you, the more likely they are to buy again. During the holidays, that gives you a unique window to re-engage customers who have drifted or gone dormant.
MarTech’s contributor suggests dividing your CRM into four rungs: two recent groups, a drifting group and a dormant group. Include customers from the last nine months in campaigns throughout the year, and connect them to paid social as custom audiences. Sending purchase data back through Meta’s Conversions API helps the platform find high-value lookalike users when Q4 ad prices rise.
Give every rung its own cadence
The recent groups stay always-on. The lapsed groups get scheduled around key moments so you don’t use the same list in every campaign. A suggested calendar looks like this:
- Recent customers: regular email schedule and always-on paid media.
- Drifting customers: five emails, including a what’s-new update in early November, a Black Friday preview, Black Friday on Nov 27, Cyber Monday on Nov 30, and a mid-December shipping reminder. Add three paid campaigns of at least a week each.
- Dormant customers: no more than three emails, plus one multiweek paid campaign from mid-November through Cyber Monday week.
Email deliverability is the reason dormant lists get fewer emails and more paid media. Old addresses can bounce, some lists hide spam traps, and forgotten brands draw complaints. Too many bad signals in one week can pull your best-customer email into spam right before Black Friday. Check the dormant list, keep sends small and start before the rush.
Match the message—and the discount—to the rung
Recent customers know your brand. Send them what’s new, personalized notes, loyalty rewards, gift guides and gift cards. Deloitte’s Natalie Martini notes that shoppers still care deeply about making the holidays special for friends and family, so loyal buyers become your warmest introduction to their gift lists.
Lapsed customers need a reason to pay attention again. Start with a what’s-new message, then follow with an offer. Reserve the biggest discounts for lapsed groups: recent buyers often respond to recognition and would have purchased anyway. That protects margin while directing incentives at people whose behavior can actually change.
Repeat purchases can account for 5% to 30% of a brand’s sales, and lapsed customers are among the best sources of repeat buyers. Deloitte economist Akrur Barua also expects online sales to rise as shoppers research and compare before buying, making lapsed comparison-shoppers a strong audience for your product updates.
Start in October, because November wins become January repeats
Deloitte defines the holiday season as November through January, and the plan should follow the same timeline. Pull your CRM now, sort customers into the four rungs, clean the dormant email list and prepare your what’s-new updates. Any customer you gain in November becomes a recent customer by January and a strong candidate for a repeat purchase.
Source: MarTech
