2025 Holiday Retail Trends: Influencer Marketing Strategies That Work

The 2025 holiday season is shaping up to be unlike recent years. With persistent inflation, rising prices, and concerns around tariffs, shoppers are entering the holidays with caution and practicality. For brands, this means competing for every dollar while building trust and loyalty among increasingly discerning consumers. 

So, how can you stand out? Lean on influencers to drive your social strategy forward. Creators help brands meet customers where they are, building trust through authentic content and driving conversions across the funnel. 

Below, we’ve compiled 5 key holiday retail trends paired with actionable influencer marketing tips to help your brand succeed. Let’s get started.

1. Holiday sales growth is slowing as consumers become more frugal.

According to eMarketer’s holiday forecast, US retail sales growth will see a rare slowdown during the 2025 holiday season. Total US retail sales for November and December 2025 are projected to rise by just 1.2%, a decline from the 2025 full-year growth rate of 1.5%. This signals fierce competition for holiday shoppers’ wallets.

This is a result of spending habits shifting dramatically: 

• Just 33% of shoppers plan to spend over $1,000 during the 2025 holiday season, a 27% drop year-over-year. 
• Meanwhile, the budget-conscious segment is growing. 34% of consumers now say they’ll spend less than $100, up from 32% last year. 
• 50% of young shoppers (ages 18–34) are prioritizing budget-friendly options, often turning to store brands or alternative labels over premium names.

What this means for marketers:

Leverage affiliate partnerships to distribute special holiday discounts. Shoppers are increasingly influenced by creators they trust, making influencers your best vehicle to promote your timely holiday discounts. You can even automate everything from link tracking to affiliate payment using Aspire’s suite of affiliate marketing tools. 

Brief creators to focus on value, not just price cuts. Double down on communicating product quality, convenience, trust, and emotional resonance. This will be key to standing out this season.

2. Despite the shorter holiday timeline, the buying period is longer.

There are only 26 days between Black Friday and Christmas this year (1 day less than last year and 6 fewer than in 2023). Yet despite the compressed timeline, shoppers aren’t rushing to buy early.

In 2025, consumer shopping behaviors are splitting into two camps:

• Early birds: 20% of consumers started shopping in July, and 38% looked to Labor Day sales.
• Last-minute buyers: 65% delay purchases until BFCM for the deepest discounts. Nearly 30% even shop within a week of Christmas, a number that jumps to 49% among those with <$100 budgets.

This creates a long, staggered shopping window, where consistency beats one big, flashy marketing campaign.

What this means for marketers:

Kick off your strategy early in Q4, starting with awareness campaigns. This is incredibly important for building brand awareness and affinity. 

But hold back some of your most compelling offers for the final stretch in late November and December. Offering services like same-day delivery, quick pickup options, and packaging that’s ready for gifting will seal the deal for frantic shoppers.

3. Consumers are shopping both in-store and online. 

A new study found that online shopping is dipping as a preferred channel this holiday season, falling from 43% in 2024 to 30% in 2025. However, that doesn’t mean ecommerce is slowing down. Instead, shoppers are now blending channels (and expecting brands to do the same). 

The same study shows that discount stores (23%) and department stores (21%) are seeing a resurgence, showcasing the strong return of brick-and-mortar shopping. 

What this means for marketers:

Adopt a true omnichannel strategy, making sure that every touchpoint — from your website to your social media profiles — is frictionless and optimized to convey a consistent story in terms of your branding, marketing copy, visual aesthetics, and overall customer experience.

If you have brick-and-mortar stores, tap into local influencers to drive foot traffic. For example, creators can make TikTok videos that surface on local For You Pages and guide followers to store locator pages featuring exclusive in-store deals. Optimize your locator for social sharing to create a smooth digital-to-physical path. To sweeten the deal and encourage action, integrate convenience-driven services like buy online, pick up in-store (BOPIS) and curbside pickup.

With these strategies, your customers still interact with your physical stores at the end of their online buying journey.

4. Social commerce is king.

Social commerce is becoming more of a norm, as 21% of shoppers say they’ll use social media to purchase holiday gifts — a significant jump from 12% last year. Shoppers are also allocating larger portions of their budgets to social: 55% say they’ll spend 11–50% of their holiday budget on these platforms, nearly doubling last year’s 33%.

What this means for marketers:

This holiday season, influencers should act as both storytellers and sales channels for your brand. Leverage creators to drive authentic product discovery, then amplify their content as ads to maximize reach. Embrace native shoppable features like TikTok Shop and YouTube Shopping to create seamless purchase experiences without forcing customers to leave the platform. This will streamline the path-to-purchase.

5. Personalization is no longer optional.

Consumers today expect every marketing touchpoint to be tailored to their interests and behaviors. In fact, 74% of consumers expect brands to provide an even more personalized shopping experience and 66% expect brands to make them feel “valued and understood.” 

With increased competition this holiday season, offering personalized shopping experiences matters more than ever. 

What this means for marketers:

Personalization should be at the core of your holiday strategy. Start by segmenting campaigns based on demographics, purchase history, location, and behavior to deliver the right message to the right audience at the right time. 

Work with a diverse array of creators who resonate with different audience segments, and repurpose their content across ads, email campaigns, and landing pages to create tailored experiences. 

By prioritizing personalization, brands can not only boost conversions but also build loyalty and emotional connections that last beyond the holiday season.

Stay ahead of the curve this season

The 2025 holiday season is shaping up to be competitive, with cautious spending, a longer shopping window, and a growing demand for seamless omnichannel experiences. To stand out, brands need to double down on value, embrace social commerce, and deliver hyper-personalized campaigns that meet shoppers where they are. 

‍Ready to elevate your holiday strategy? Get in touch with us to build your own creator-led campaigns that drive awareness, traffic, and sales this season.