Key Takeaways
- Adobe expects US online holiday sales to reach $275.1 billion from November 1 to December 31, up 6.7%, with social media's share of revenue rising 17% and paid search's rising 4%.
- Influencers and creators account for 22% of affiliate traffic, the second largest source behind cashback and rewards partners at 36%.
- Social media tied physical stores as the top source of holiday gift ideas at 46% in Sprout Social's Q3 2026 pulse survey, and 57% of consumers are open to buying inside a social app.
- Salesforce found global digital traffic rose 18% in Q2 while order volume grew just 1%, and engagement with brand-owned properties fell 7% year over year.
Holiday planning decks still tend to start with the search budget and treat social as the awareness line above it. This year's forecasts say that ordering is backwards. The fastest-growing share of holiday revenue is coming from the feed and the creators in it, while the channel most retailers trust to close the sale is growing at a quarter of the pace.
The catch is that the feed is very good at generating visits and much less reliable at turning them into orders. Brands that shift budget toward social without fixing what happens after the tap risk buying more of the traffic that is already failing to convert.
The Revenue Is Following the Feed
Adobe's 2026 holiday forecast, released on September 28 and based on Adobe Analytics data from US retail sites, projects $275.1 billion in online spending between November 1 and December 31, up 6.7% year over year. Cyber Monday is set to remain the biggest day at $15.1 billion, with Black Friday growing faster at $12.9 billion, up 9.2%.
The more useful number for marketers sits further down the release. Adobe measures each channel's contribution to revenue, and it expects social media's share to rise 17% this season and affiliates and partners, a category that includes social influencers, to rise 12%. Paid search is expected to rise 4%. Within affiliate traffic, cashback and rewards partners lead with a 36% share, followed by influencers and creators at 22%.
Mobile is pulling in the same direction. Adobe expects phones to account for 57.4% of season spend, up from 56.4% last year, and a record 63% on Thanksgiving. Buy Now Pay Later is forecast to drive $21.3 billion over November and December, with 82% of it coming through mobile. The season is being shaped on the device where people scroll, and increasingly paid for there too.
Consumer research points the same way. Sprout Social's Q3 2026 pulse survey, published on October 5, found social media tied physical stores as the top place consumers look for gift ideas, at 46% each, well ahead of TV at 31%, review sites at 23% and AI chatbots at 15%.
Clicks Are Up, Orders Are Not
If the story ended there, the answer would be to move money. It does not. Salesforce's 2026 holiday predictions, built on its Shopping Index, show global digital traffic up 18% in the second quarter while order volume grew only 1%. Social media drove 29% more ecommerce visits over the same period, and consumer-reported social purchases rose 17% year over year while purchases on brand websites and marketplaces stayed flat.
Two other figures in that analysis should worry anyone whose holiday plan ends at a product page. Engagement with brand-owned properties fell 7% year over year, and native social shops still account for only 7% to 9% of total orders. Shoppers are discovering in the feed, but most of them still have to leave it to buy, and the brand's own site is where attention is thinning.
That gap is the real opportunity. Sprout found 57% of consumers are open to completing a purchase inside a social app this season, made up of 38% who have done it before and plan to again and 19% who plan to try it for the first time. Salesforce forecasts that social commerce will grow about nine times faster than traditional ecommerce this holiday. The channels that remove the hop between discovery and checkout are the ones positioned to collect the growth.
What Actually Moves a Social Shopper
Sprout's survey is specific about which content converts. Promo codes shared by brands or influencers were the top social purchase trigger at 30%. Brand posts showing products in action came next at 28%, original holiday content from brands at 26%, and content from everyday, non-influencer users at 22%.
That ranking favours practical creative over polished campaigns. A tracked creator code does two jobs at once, giving the shopper a reason to act now and giving the brand a way to attribute a sale that would otherwise look like direct or organic traffic. A product demo cut for the feed answers the question a gift buyer actually has, which is whether the thing works and what it looks like in someone's hands.
Timing matters as well. Half of Sprout's respondents named October or November as the ideal launch window for holiday campaigns, and 49% said campaigns starting as early as August make them more likely to buy. Adobe expects $95.8 billion to be spent online in October alone, up 8%. The feed is already in season, and the brands still finalising Black Friday creative are arriving after the browsing has started.
Service is moving onto social alongside sales. Sprout found 27% of consumers expect to use social more for holiday customer service than last year. When the same app is where a shopper found the product, asked the question and might complete the purchase, a slow reply is a lost order rather than a support metric.
What Social Teams Should Do Before Black Friday
- Rebalance on revenue share, not habit. With social's revenue share forecast to rise 17% against 4% for paid search, test moving incremental budget toward social and creator partnerships while holding search steady on proven terms.
- Give every creator a trackable code. Promo codes were the top social purchase trigger at 30%, and they make influencer revenue visible in reporting instead of leaking into direct traffic.
- Lead with products in action. Demonstration posts outperformed original holiday content as a trigger, so prioritise short demo cuts over a single hero film and test which ones earn the spend.
- Shorten the path to checkout. With 57% open to buying in-app and orders lagging traffic, turn on native shops where it makes sense and audit every mobile landing page for load time and payment options.
- Staff social care for peak. Plan response times for Cyber Week as a sales function, since 27% of shoppers expect to use social more for service this season.
- Keep partner content on brand. When creators drive 22% of affiliate traffic, share clear brand guidelines and approved assets early so that a growing share of the season's content still reads as yours.
None of this makes paid search irrelevant. It still grows, and it still captures demand that already knows what it wants. But the forecasts agree that the demand is being created somewhere else, and that the brands winning the season will be the ones that can turn a scroll into a sale without asking the shopper to start over.
