Retail readiness 2025: Testing, targeting, and AI that delivers

2025 Mid-Year Holiday Check-In

It’s July, which means it’s time for a serious check-in on holiday readiness. If you’re in retail marketing, you’ve likely already done a post-mortem on your 2024 holiday results, and maybe filed that away. Let’s bring it back! Now is the moment to revisit those insights and make sure your 2025 strategy reflects the wins, the misses, and the new realities of the year ahead.

2025 is a fascinating year from a timing and technology standpoint. With a longer lead-up to peak weeks and aggressive shifts in shopper behavior, I expect full-funnel AI activation to finally take center stage. Across the retail space, we’re seeing forward-looking brands focus on:

• Propensity scoring to prioritize top-converting audiences
• Dynamic content assembly personalized to each shopper
• Predictive suppression to avoid fatigue and unsubscribe spikes
  

These aren’t flashy experiments. They’re practical applications of AI that fuel smart segmentation, automate personalization in real time, and scale decisioning for replenishment, price-sensitive categories, and gift discovery.

From a Cordial perspective, we’re releasing new AI models nearly weekly. We can’t keep the data scientists down! They know retailers are going to need these tools in play for Q4, but getting there will require focused work now. I’ve been documenting tests and strategies to make sure our clients are ramping toward impact before October 1. And let’s be honest—holiday is already knocking. I saw Halloween messaging hit my inbox last week.

AI tests to prioritize now

To make these strategies real and ready for prime time, you need to get test results before October. Here are a few AI-powered test ideas we’re running with retail clients now, using Cordial’s built-in models:

• Propensity Models
  • A/B test segment performance between Cordial’s high-propensity audience and your legacy audience filters
  • Use predictions to throttle message frequency and compare unsub and engagement rates
• Content Affinity + Dynamic Assembly
  • Test performance of dynamically personalized content blocks vs. static templates
  • Run a browse → triggered message test using dynamic templates driven by affinity scoring
• Predictive Send Time & Fatigue Management
  • Compare campaign metrics using predicted send time optimization vs. fixed time drops – note that Cordial’s STO is enhanced and FAR better than the STO of old. Clients are seeing incredible results using this tool.
  • Layer fatigue scoring into suppression rules and measure lift in click-to-open rates
• Channel Propensity + Sequencing
  • Trigger a message on each user’s predicted next-best channel and compare conversion rates
  • Sequence campaigns based on Cordial’s signal strength data and test flow performance
• Price Sensitivity Models
  • Personalize discount tiers based on sensitivity score and test revenue lift vs. broad discounting
  • Suppress promo messages for “full-price” buyers and evaluate margin impact

These are lean, fast tests with high strategic payoff. You don’t need to rebuild your holiday program, just consider activating intelligence where it matters most. What matters most is what you learn. Set up every test with a clear success metric and loop insights back into your program design.

On the channel front, it’s no longer about siloed execution. Leading brands are combining behavioral signals with AI to sequence messages across SMS, email, push, and more. Intent is the driver. If we know how a shopper has engaged and where they’re likely to respond next, we can design a channel mix that guides them to conversion. Think: mobile browse → SMS nudge → cart abandon email → follow-up with a personalized push. Cordial’s channel propensity model helps make this sequencing smarter and more automated.

Another frequent conversation this year is how digital can support brick-and-mortar efforts, and vice versa. The boundary between store and digital is fading. That’s a good thing, if you know how to use it.

For retailers with physical locations, this holiday is about turning store visits into personalized journeys, and using digital to drive in-store traffic with purpose:

• Use real-time POS data to suppress irrelevant offers or kick off post-visit journeys
• Promote store-specific inventory or in-store events based on location behavior
• Deliver app-exclusive perks like skip-the-line access or early product drops

This isn’t new territory, but the difference today is that platforms like Cordial let you actually execute on these ideas without a six-month IT project. What used to be vision is now practical reality.

Gift discovery deserves focused attention. AI can help surface the right ideas, for the right people, at the right time. Leverage past gifting behavior, browse patterns, and preference data to recommend giftable items, create custom gift guides, and segment out likely gift-buyers. Early activation of these audiences makes a measurable difference in revenue timing and cart size.

At the foundation of all this is intent-led marketing. Every message across every channel – batch, triggered, lifecycle, transactional – should be personalized and purposeful. Some of the tactics I’m prioritizing with clients right now:

• Trigger-first strategy, followed by complementary broadcast messaging with relevant personalization
• Price sensitivity modeling to preserve margin by holding offers for customers likely to convert without them
• Activation of subtle signals like browse velocity, favoriting, or wish list updates to identify gift buyers early
• Holiday retargeting based on last year’s purchase behavior. If they were a gifter in 2024, let’s make it easy for them again in 2025

Testing isn’t a one-and-done checkpoint. Retailers that consistently iterate based on intent data outperform when peak season hits. And this level of program sophistication doesn’t sit in a vacuum. Aligning with product, store ops, and digital teams is where strategies like this get traction and scale.

Finally, let’s not forget privacy. Shoppers expect transparency in personalization. This is the value exchange. If you’re going to use their data, make it useful. Some simple but strategic ways to make this work:

• Be clear about why content is shown: “Because you bought…” still works
• Let shoppers opt in to special holiday messaging across channels
• Use zero-party data to power gift guides and create custom shopping flows

We’re officially in the back half of the year, and the runway to holiday is short. Your Q4 performance will come down to what you’re testing, learning, and activating right now. This is the moment to sharpen your strategy, pressure-test bold ideas, and build programs that flex in real time with shopper behavior. Wishing you a smart, smooth, and standout season ahead.

Let’s talk about this. What are you working on to prep for holiday?