Black Friday prep for a small business website: a 10-day plan

Black Friday gives a small business website a few busy days and a long quiet stretch afterwards. The people who arrive are in a hurry, comparing tabs on a phone, and they leave at the first slow page, broken link or surprise at checkout. Most of what goes wrong is not dramatic. It is a banner that points to the wrong page, a photo that takes six seconds to appear, a discount code that does not stack the way the email said it would.

This plan fits ten days. In 2026 Black Friday falls on Friday 27 November, so day 1 is Tuesday 17 November and day 10 is Thursday 26 November. If you are reading this earlier, use the weeks in between for the slower jobs below.

Before day 1: the slow jobs

Some preparation cannot be squeezed into ten days. If you have time now, start these:

• Photos. Listings with clear, consistent pictures sell better than the same items with rushed ones. Our guide to photographing products on your phone walks through a one-afternoon setup.
• Your email list. Someone who signed up in October is far easier to reach than a stranger in November. See email list basics for a local shop.
• A gift page. Shoppers who do not know what to buy look for help. A well-built gift guide page turns browsing into baskets.
• Stock and supplier dates. If an item can run out or arrive late, you want to know by day 1, not on the day.

The ten days at a glance

If you do not work weekends, shuffle those tasks to days you do. The order matters more than the dates.

Day 1: decide the offer and write the rules

Write the offer in a single sentence a stranger could repeat: "Twenty percent off all candles until Sunday midnight" or "Free local delivery on orders over 40 until Monday." If you cannot, shoppers will not grasp it in the two seconds they give your banner.

Then write the rules on paper:

1. What is included, and what is excluded.
2. When it starts and ends, with the time zone.
3. Whether it combines with other offers or codes.
4. The last day for orders that must arrive before the holidays.
5. What happens when something sells out.

Price honestly. Show the normal price and the offer price, and only compare to a price you have really charged. A shopper who feels tricked does not come back, and in many places pricing claims are regulated.

Day 2: baseline and the fix list

You cannot improve what you have not measured. Run your homepage, your offer page (or the page you plan to use) and your busiest product page through the Belmo grader. Note the four scores for speed, mobile, search and security, and read the numbered list of fixes. Copy the top five into a note and mark each as "today", "this week" or "after Friday".

Then open your site in a private window on your phone, on mobile data rather than home Wi-Fi, and count how long until you can read the first headline. That number is the one customers feel.

Day 3: speed

Speed problems on small sites are usually images. A single photo straight off a camera can weigh more than the rest of the page together. Resize photos to the size they are shown, save them in a modern format, and load the ones below the first screen lazily. Our guide to image optimization for a faster website has exact steps, and website speed for small business explains what the measurements mean.

Beyond images, look for:

• Chat widgets, pop-ups and extra scripts that you added once and never removed. Each one costs load time.
• Fonts: two families and a few weights is plenty.

Grade again at the end of the day, and keep the fixes that moved the speed score.

Day 4: the mobile walk-through

On a busy shopping day most visitors hold a phone. Sit down with yours and do the whole journey as a customer: land on the offer, find a product, add it, change the quantity, reach the checkout, pay, and read the confirmation. Write down every moment of friction.

• Buttons and links should be big enough for a thumb, roughly 44 pixels tall.
• The offer, price and delivery cost should be visible without zooming.
• Forms should open the right keyboard: numbers for phone, email for email.
• Nothing should sit on top of the content, including cookie bars, chat bubbles and sticky banners.

Day 5: offer page, banner and one main button

Now build or update the page that carries the offer. Keep the structure plain: a headline that states the offer, one line of rules, the products, and one main button. Everything else is secondary.

• Headline. The offer in the shopper's words, plus the end date.
• Main button. Benefit-led and specific, such as "Shop the candle sale", not "Click here".
• Banner. A slim bar on the homepage linking straight to the offer page, not to the home page of the shop.
• Trust line. Delivery times, returns and contact details close to the button.
• Dates. Say clearly when the offer ends, and take the banner down on time.

Day 6: test every path that takes money or details

Place a real order, or a test order if your system allows it, from start to finish. Do it twice: once with a discount code and once without. Check each of these:

1. The total at the basket matches the price on the page, including tax and delivery.
2. The payment works with a card and with any wallet option you advertise.
3. The confirmation page and the confirmation email arrive, with the right items and your contact details.
4. Contact and booking forms send a message that actually reaches a person.
5. Out-of-stock items cannot be bought, and the message is friendly.

If you take bookings or quote requests rather than orders, send yourself one through every form and see how long the reply takes. Fix what you find, then test again.

Day 7: email and social, scheduled

Write the messages now, while you are calm. A good sequence is short:

• A "coming soon" note to your list two or three days before, with the date and what to expect.
• A "starts now" message on the morning with one link.
• A reminder for the last day.

Each message should link to the offer page, not the homepage, and use the same wording as the banner. If you are starting a list, email list basics covers the wording and a first welcome message. Schedule social posts the same way.

Day 8: people, stock and replies

Sort out the physical side. Count stock for the items on offer. Tell anyone who helps what the offer is and who handles which question. If you run a shop with an opening routine, print a checklist for the door so nothing is forgotten on a busy morning; the free Door Go checklist maker builds one in a few minutes. Write short reply templates for the five questions you always get: delivery, returns, stock, sizing or fit, and discounts.

Day 9: freeze and final grade

Stop making changes to the live site. A late tweak is how a broken menu reaches the busiest day. Before the freeze:

1. Read every page aloud for typos, dates and prices.
2. Click every link in the banner, the emails and the posts.
3. Back up your site and your product list.
4. Run the grader one last time and compare it with day 2.
5. Check that the privacy page and contact details are present and correct.

Day 10: last checks, then rest

On the evening before, open the site on your phone on mobile data and read the offer page start to finish. Confirm that scheduled emails and posts are queued for the right times. Write down who you would call if the site went down. Then stop: tired owners make worse decisions than an unfinished page does.

During and after

On Friday, glance at the site a few times, answer messages promptly and watch the stock. Resist changing the page in a panic unless something is clearly broken, and mark sold-out items with a return date.

The weekend after is a second chance. Small Business Saturday on 28 November and Cyber Monday on 30 November bring their own shoppers, so keep the offer page up and update the wording rather than starting over. When it all ends, thank customers, take the banner down and write three lines: what worked, what slowed you down, and what you would do on day 1 next time. That note is the most useful thing the whole exercise produces.

Questions people ask

When should I start preparing for Black Friday?

Ten days is the minimum for the website itself. Photos, an email list and a gift page take longer, so begin those weeks earlier if you can.

Do I have to discount to take part?

No. A bundle, free delivery, a gift with purchase or an early access window can work as well, and they protect your margin. Pick one offer you can afford and explain it clearly.

How can I tell whether my site will cope with the extra visitors?

Check the basics: a fast first screen, light images and as few extra scripts as possible. Run the grader and fix the speed items. Fast, simple pages hold up under load much better than heavy ones.

What should I do if the site is slow on the day?

Do not change many things at once. Remove the heaviest recent addition, such as a large banner image or a widget, test the page on mobile data, and tell customers by email or social post if there is a known problem.