BlackBerry PlayBook Black Friday Fire Sale Increased PlayBook Traffic 46% - Created TouchPad Black Market

The BlackBerry PlayBook when reduced to $199.99 for the 16GB model it sold-out at Best Buy on Black Friday and then quickly sold-out at RIM's direct sales website.  The fabulous fire sale ended on December 8 and so did the huge increase in PlayBook traffic.

Best Buy buyers who had their sales cancelled were told that Best Buy would be getting more in stock.  Best Buy does have both the 16GB and 32GB PlayBook tablets in stock for $499.99 and $599.99 respectively.  We believe we know why the traffic dropped off.  Once again black market tablet buyers, bought the cheap tablets and to then sell them on eBay for a profit and from Amazon.com PlayBookresellers for a profit at around $250.00.  They probably were testing them out to see if they should keep them or not.

Chitika Insights conducted a research study to track the level of online activity for the PlayBook from November 14th until November 30th, using a sample which covered hundreds of millions of impressions.

On Black Friday the level of online activity for the PlayBook increased rapidly — highlighted by a tremendous jump from the evening of November 27 to the morning of November 28th which may means that PlayBook owners were looking to buy more online.

An additional interesting piece of data is reflected in the level of online activity on Monday morning which some are interpreting to mean that the users were returning the newly purchased cheap PlayBooks.

Chitika will continue monitoring activity for the Playbook to see if 2011 holiday season really helped to drive Playbook traffic or not.

Chitika Insights conducted a research study to track the level of online activity for the PlayBook and to identify any interesting insights about the sale. This study covered a time frame of hourly data starting from November 14th until November 30th, using a sample which covered hundreds of millions of impressions.