The ten jobs at a glance
| # | Job | Time | What it prevents |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Stop changing regular prices | 15 minutes | A "was" price that breaks EU rules |
| 2 | Open an early-access sign-up | 1–2 hours | Starting Black Week with nobody to email |
| 3 | Set up discounts with end dates | 1 hour | A sale that never ends, or starts at the wrong hour |
| 4 | Show delivery dates and cut-offs | 1 hour | "Will it arrive in time?" left unanswered |
| 5 | Check delivery and returns text | 45 minutes | Shoppers leaving at checkout over unclear returns |
| 6 | Check stock settings | 30 minutes | Selling products you don't have |
| 7 | Place test orders | 1 hour | A broken discount or email on the busiest day |
| 8 | Check payment and fraud settings | 30 minutes | Chargebacks, and card payments switched off |
| 9 | Check your theme's speed | 1 hour | Slow product pages on a phone |
| 10 | Decide who is on call | 30 minutes | Questions that wait until Monday |
Jobs 1 and 2 are first because they can't wait: one depends on prices you charge from now on, the other needs weeks to grow. The rest can be done in any order, but do job 7 after job 3, because you want to test the real discounts.
1. Stop changing regular prices (15 minutes)
In the EU, when you announce a discount, the "was" price you show must be the lowest price you charged in the 30 days before. The European Commission put it plainly in March 2026: "Discounts must be based on the lowest price applied in the past 30 days." In its check of 314 online traders that spring, 30% got their discounts wrong.
For a sale on 27 November, those 30 days started on 28 October. If you start earlier, for example with early access, the window starts earlier too. So from today, leave regular prices alone. If you've raised or lowered a price in the last few days, write down the lowest one: that's your "was" price.
Shopify won't work this out for you. Its Help Center says you enter the lowest prior price yourself, for example in the compare-at price field, and that "you're responsible" for getting it right. We explain the rule, the "-30%" sum and where Shopify trips shops up in the EU 30-day price rule for Black Friday. This is not legal advice.
2. Open an early-access sign-up (1–2 hours)
Your best Black Friday buyers are people who already know you. A simple "get the offer a day early" sign-up, opened this week, gives you four weeks to collect names without paying for ads, and gives you someone to email on the Thursday before.
Keep the first version small: one line on the home page, one on your best-selling product pages, and an email to your existing list. While you're at it, check that your email domain is set up. Shopify's checklist tells shops to set up DMARC, SPF and DKIM records, so mail providers can check your emails are really from you.
The full steps, including EU consent rules, are in how to build a Black Friday early-access list in 4 weeks.
3. Set up discounts with start and end dates (1 hour)
Build the discount now, with dates, so you're not doing it on the night itself. In Shopify, open Discounts, create the discount, and fill in Active dates. Two details matter:
- The end date. Shopify's Help Center: "If you don't choose an end date for your discount, then it doesn't expire."
- The time zone. The start and end times follow the time zone set in your Shopify admin. If you sell across borders, say which time zone your sale ends in.
Check the Combinations section too: decide whether your Black Friday code may be combined with other codes, or with a free-delivery discount. And keep count: Shopify allows a maximum of 25 active automatic discounts, including discounts from apps.
If you're not sure a percentage off is right for your margins, read Black Friday without big discounts before you build it.
4. Show delivery dates and cut-offs (1 hour)
"Will it arrive in time?" is one of the most common reasons to hesitate in November. Answer it before it's asked.
Shopify can show a delivery date range at checkout instead of a vague transit time. Go to Settings > Shipping and delivery > Estimated delivery dates, choose Manual, and pick a fulfillment time. You need shipping profiles (not the legacy settings) and a rate type that includes transit times. A few rules from the Help Center worth knowing:
- Business days are Monday to Friday; weekends and holidays don't count.
- Orders placed after 12 pm, in your shipping origin's local time, count from the next business day.
- Dates only show when the product's stock is above zero.
Then write your own cut-offs in plain words, on product pages and in the cart: "Order by Thursday for delivery before the weekend." Carriers publish their Christmas dates during November and December; when yours does, add your last order date for Christmas and give yourself a day or two of margin. The 5-week plan has last year's carrier dates as a guide.
5. Check your delivery and returns text (45 minutes)
Shoppers read the returns policy more carefully when they buy a gift. In Shopify, policies live under Settings > Policies. Once added, they're linked automatically in the checkout footer, the returns policy on the order review page, and the shipping policy on product pages and in the cart.
Read yours on a phone and check three things:
- It matches the law. In the EU, people can cancel an online order within 14 days of delivery without giving a reason.
- It says who pays for the return. Shopify's checklist cites a 2025 KPMG survey in which 41% of UK consumers said a lack of free return postage had stopped them buying online from a company. That figure is UK-only, but the point travels.
- It covers gifts. If you'll accept returns of November purchases until January, say so, and say it on the product pages, not only in the policy.
6. Check stock settings (30 minutes)
Overselling costs you twice: a refund and an unhappy customer in your busiest week. For every product in the sale, open the product in Shopify and check that Track quantity is on.
Then check the Sell when out of stock setting. The default is "Stop selling when out of stock", so customers can't add a product with no stock to their cart. If someone switched a product to "Continue selling when out of stock" for a pre-order once, switch it back, unless you really can deliver more. Shopify's checklist also suggests hiding sold-out products, so people don't order what you can't send.
7. Place test orders (1 hour)
Do this after job 3, with the real discounts, on a phone. Shopify gives three ways to test: its test payment gateway, Shopify Payments test mode, or a real order that you cancel and refund straight away (processing fees may apply then).
To use Shopify Payments test mode: Settings > Payments, Manage under Shopify Payments, then Enable test mode. Pay with the test card 4242 4242 4242 4242, any future expiry date and any three-digit code. Try the declined-card number 4000 0000 0000 0002 too, to see what a shopper sees when a payment fails.
For each test, check the price, the "was" price, the delivery cost and date, and the emails. Shopify's checklist says to confirm that both the order confirmation and the shipping notification arrive.
Then, and this is the important part, switch test mode off. Shopify's warning: customers can't place live card orders while your payment providers are in test mode. Do the whole test again in the week before Black Friday.
8. Check payment and fraud settings (30 minutes)
More orders also means more risky orders. Shopify's fraud analysis marks medium- and high-risk orders with a warning on the Orders page, and may suggest "Confirm with the customer before fulfilling" or "Consider canceling this order". Shopify's advice: "Wait for the fraud analysis to finish before you fulfill the order." It usually takes seconds, rarely a few minutes.
Agree now who looks at flagged orders during Black Week, and what they do: contact the customer, or cancel and refund. If you want more time to check orders before money moves, Shopify mentions manual payment capture as an option. And check job 7 one more time: test mode must be off.
9. Check your theme's speed (1 hour)
Don't rebuild anything four weeks out. Just look. In Shopify, the Themes page under Online Store shows a performance summary, based on real visitors over the past 30 days. Fuller reports are under Analytics > Reports. Shopify counts these as good:
| Measure | What it means | Good |
|---|---|---|
| Largest Contentful Paint | How fast the main content loads | 2,500 ms or less |
| Interaction to Next Paint | How fast the page reacts to a tap | 200 ms or less |
| Cumulative Layout Shift | How much the page jumps while loading | 0.1 or less |
The data can be up to 36 hours behind, and small stores may see big swings; Shopify suggests a weekly or monthly view then. If a number is poor, the quick fixes are the ones Shopify's checklist names: remove apps and scripts you no longer use, and check the slowest pages. Pop-ups that push content around also count against layout shift.
10. Decide who is on call (30 minutes)
A shopper with one question about size or delivery is close to buying. An answer the next morning is often too late. Write a simple rota for 23 to 30 November: who answers chat and email, who packs, who checks flagged orders, and until what time.
Shopify's checklist suggests setting chat hours in Shopify Inbox with an automatic reply outside them, updating your FAQ page, and getting help in if you're a very small team: a friend for packing on Saturday counts.
If you only have one evening
Do jobs 1, 3, 4 and 7: freeze your prices, build one discount with an end date, show delivery dates at checkout, and place a test order on a phone, then switch test mode off. That covers most of what goes wrong.
Where Signal fits
Many of the questions in job 10 are the same every day: "Will it arrive by Friday?", "Is it a gift?" Signal can ask a visitor one short question, like "When do you need it by?", and show the answer that fits on the page, such as your delivery date or your returns for gifts. Shoppers can also ask a question on the product page and get your answer from your inbox, or by email if they've left.
Its script is small and loads after your page, so it doesn't hold up your product pages. You can run it in shadow mode first, to see what it would do before shoppers see anything. It works on Shopify and on any shop that lets you add a script, from €39 a month; see pricing.
When this list isn't enough
If your checkout is broken, your stock is wrong in many places, or you're moving to a new theme, a day per job won't fix it. Then the honest choice is a smaller Black Friday: one offer on a few products you know well, and a bigger push for Christmas or next year.
