[caption id="attachment_74136" align="aligncenter" width="650"] Photo: Shutterstock[/caption]For savvy online shoppers who disdain visits to the mall, Cyber Monday is the day to bag in great sales for the Christmas season. The sales day follows what is called "Black Friday" which is always after Thanksgiving day. Black Friday is the biggest retail day of the Christmas season. However, in recent years, Black Monday has taken off and last year came close to reaching the $2 billion mark in sales. Put in perspective, in 2012 Cyber Monday surpassed Black Friday in retail sales for the first time.

This year, analysts expect the day to take in between $1.5 to $2.0 billion. However, if social media repeats it's magic from last year the numbers can lead to another record breaking year for the event. This is because social media and Pinterest successfully drove additional online sales with links to special deals. Facebook & Twitter took in the lion's share of social media driven sales owning 77% of the market share.

The online vendors raking in the most online sales are Walmart.com, Amazon.com, Bestbuy.com and Target.com. It is customary that retailers do not announce their deals until the actual day likely to avoid taking sales from Black Friday events. This year's Black Monday falls on December 2.

On The Web:
Cyber Monday 2013: Dec. 2 online sales expected to be bigger, better than ever
http://www.abc15.com/dpp/news/national/cyber-monday-2013-dec-2-online-sales-expected-to-be-bigger-better-than-ever