Fall brings a surge in family and consumer spending, making shifts in customer behavior easier to see.
This fall, customers are discovering earlier, scrutinizing value harder, using AI to research, and moving freely between digital and physical touchpoints.
Four growth opportunities stand out for marketing and CX leaders heading into Q4 and early 2027:
- Earn preference earlier
By early July, 62% of back-to-school shoppers had already started shopping, signaling a longer window between initial interest and purchase. - Give value seekers more reasons to choose you
Deloitte’s hyper-value seekers planned to spend about $610 per child, 14% more than other shoppers, even while actively looking for ways to save. - Make your brand easier for AI to find and trust
47% of U.S. shoppers say they have used AI for at least one shopping-related task, putting AI directly into the discovery and consideration journey. - Connect digital influence to the full customer journey
Deloitte reported $737 per child in planned spending among parents using search, social and GenAI, versus $381 among non-tech users, reinforcing the value of understanding influence across the journey.
Sources: NRF back-to-school research; Deloitte 2026 Back-to-School Survey; Visa 2025 Spending Shift Report.
Growth Opportunity #1: Earn preference earlier
Customers are entering the decision journey earlier without necessarily buying earlier.
Only 48% of planned spending was expected to happen by the end of July, down from 61% in 2025. NRF found that shoppers still had several reasons to hold off, including waiting for better deals, figuring out what they needed and spreading out their budgets.
Source: NRF’s 2026 Back-to-School survey, conducted by Prosper Insights & Analytics
Put that longer consideration window to work:
- Use search, site behavior and CRM engagement to identify early intent.
- Give researching customers reasons to keep considering your brand while they wait to buy.
- Use what customers reveal in one interaction to make the next one more relevant.
- Measure what indicates movement toward purchase, not only the transaction itself.
The takeaway: Earlier intent gives brands more time to influence the decision before purchase.
Growth Opportunity #2: Give value seekers more reasons to choose you
Price sensitivity does not automatically mean low customer value.
Deloitte found 31% of surveyed parents qualify as “hyper-value seekers”, using four or more tactics to save money. Yet those shoppers plan to spend about $610 per child, 14% more than other shoppers.
These shoppers chase promotions, switch brands and shop across formats to maximize value. 71% said they would switch brands if their preferred option became too expensive.
Source: Deloitte, 2026 Back-to-School Survey.
The opportunity is to make the value of choosing your brand easier to see.
That shifts the value equation toward:
- Clear product and service value
- Relevant offers rather than blanket promotions
- Loyalty benefits people actually use
- Convenience and availability
- Personalized experiences that reduce decision friction
For financial services brands, the same principle applies to rewards, card benefits, offers and services tied to actual customer behavior. The strongest value proposition is not always the biggest incentive. It is the one that makes the relationship more useful.
The takeaway: Value-conscious customers can still be high-value customers. Give them a reason to choose you beyond price.
Growth Opportunity #3: Make your brand easier for AI to find and trust
AI is becoming part of how customers research, compare and narrow their choices.
Visa found that 47% of U.S. consumers have already used AI for at least one shopping-related task, with gift discovery, price comparison and product research among the leading use cases.
Source: Visa, 2025 Spending Shift Report.
But consumers are still cautious about handing over the final decision.
Gartner found that willingness to let AI make purchase decisions topped out at just 11%. Among consumers who recently used AI while shopping, 54% said they had to double-check the accuracy of all the information GenAI provided.
Pressure-test the basics:
- Does your brand appear in AI answers, and is the information credible enough to earn citation?
- Is your product, pricing, availability and policy information current?
- Does your content answer the questions customers ask while comparing options?
- Can AI find credible evidence for the claims that differentiate your brand?
- Can you see where AI is influencing discovery, referral traffic or customer action?
SEO and GEO now belong in the same conversation as content, data and CX strategy. Brands need to know whether they appear in AI answers, what shapes those answers and whether that visibility drives action.
The takeaway: Make your brand easier for AI to represent accurately and for customers to verify with confidence.
Growth Opportunity #4: Connect digital influence to the full customer journey
Digital influence is building value across more of the customer journey, but most measurement still happens channel by channel.
Deloitte reports average planned spending of $737 per child among parents using search, social and GenAI, compared with $381 among non-tech users. That does not prove digital tools caused the higher spending, but it does show how much influence can accumulate across discovery, research and consideration.
Source: Deloitte, 2026 Back-to-School Survey.
A customer may move through search, social, AI, your website and CRM before converting somewhere else.
Search → social → AI → website → CRM → store → loyalty → next purchase
Customers can move through most of those channels before converting. Measure each touchpoint in isolation and much of the growth story disappears.
Connected signals tell marketers:
- What customers are interested in
- Which interactions move them closer to a decision
- Where friction interrupts the journey
- Which interaction should come next
- What actually contributed to growth
The takeaway: Connect measurement across the journey so you can see what actually drives growth.
Turn fall behavior into your Q4 plan
As you plan for Q4 and 2027, bring four questions into the room:
- Are we identifying customer intent early enough to influence the decision?
- Are we giving value-conscious customers a compelling reason to choose us?
- Can AI accurately find, understand and represent our brand?
- Can we connect customer signals across channels and use them to improve the next interaction?
You do not need to chase every new behavior, but you do need to know which ones are changing how your customers discover, decide and buy.
Where is your next CX growth opportunity?
Bold Orange connects strategy, data, technology, media and CRM around the moments that resonate with customers and create measurable growth.
As you look ahead, use customer behavior to spot change early and prioritize the experience shifts that will keep you ahead of changing expectations.
If this raised questions about your Q4 priorities, 2027 roadmap or where your next CX growth opportunity lies, we’d love to talk.