When online retailer Amazon announced in June that a follow-up to last year's Prime Day was in the works, some were left feeling skeptical. Although Amazon hailed last year's event for generating more sales than the previous Black Friday, #PrimeDayFail trended on social media as consumers were less than impressed with many items on sale and the length of Amazon's signature Lightning Deals.

But this year went much more smoothly, and Amazon has publicly lauded its second-annual Prime Day as a huge success.

This year's Prime Day saw a 60 percent increase in sales worldwide from last year's event and was the single biggest sales day in Amazon history — beating out all previous Black Fridays and Cyber Mondays. Sales began at midnight July 12 and included deals in all departments in addition to the Amazon-selected Lightning Deals. All deals were open exclusively to Amazon Prime members, since the ultimate goal of Prime Day is to increase sign-ups.

Once consumers have signed up, they tend to spend more money with Amazon — Prime members spend an estimated $1,200 a year on Amazon in comparison to the $500 a year nonmembers spend. Consumers can join Prime through a free 30-day trial, followed by a monthly fee of $10.99 or an annual fee of $99.

Among the benefits offered by Prime are lower prices, free two-day shipping and free video streaming. Prime is estimated to have more than 63 million U.S. members and a boasts a 91 percent retention rate among members.

Amazon did not release specific sales numbers for the event, but the company did break down some of the best sellers by region. Predictable items, like laptops, headphones and cookware, made up the list, as did Amazon-branded items including Kindle e-readers, the Amazon Fire TV Stick and the voice-controlled speaker Echo.

But among the deals on TVs and kitchen appliances were some odd deals that — while perhaps not as shocking — may give last year's 55-gallon drum of lube a run for its money in the strangeness department. Those deals included a motion-activated toilet light, an egg incubation checker and a rubber inflatable pony.

Shoppers took to social media to share some of the weirder deals like last year, but social media was much kinder. Adobe Digital Insights tracked social mentions of Prime Day across platforms and found a 39 percent sentiment of sadness in comparison to the 50 percent sentiment of sadness detected during last year's sale.

There were some small hiccups along the way. A glitch early on in the sale prohibited some customers from being able to add items to their cart, but the problem was solved within a couple of hours. Amazon did not report on whether the glitch hurt sales.

Additionally, concerns about the day's sales arose when Channel Advisor, the e-commerce software company that helps many small businesses sell on Amazon, reported flat sales compared to last year's Prime Day. But since Channel Advisor only works with a small portion of Amazon vendors, and the company reported their findings at the midday mark before the sale was over, financial advisers believe they failed to capture the full scope of the sale.

A news release published by Amazon the day after the sale portrayed things in a much more positive light. In addition to being the most successful sales day the company has ever had, Prime members and businesses also benefited. Amazon reported that Prime members saved more than double on deals, and businesses, particularly small businesses, saw record-breaking sales.

In order to participate in the sale, businesses were required to discount their items 20 percent, but the exposure Prime Day can give is powerful. Vivere, a small hammock company based out of Ontario, sold 24,000 hammocks on Prime Day and sold out of its merchandise. The exact numbers aren't in yet for this year, but 14 million items were sold during Prime Day by small businesses during last year's sale.

All of the positive feedback seems to be enough to have secured another Prime Day. "After yesterday's results, we'll definitely be doing this again," said Greg Greely, vice president of Amazon, in a statement.

And with analysts predicting the retailer will become the No. 1 apparel seller by 2017, next year's Prime Day is in line to be the biggest one yet.