The Good and Bad of Using Coupons
Coupons are a great way to drum up additional business if you are running a mail order business... and with a web based mail order business, there is no mailing cost so it is very cost effective.
I implemented a coupon system into my shopping cart a year ago and here are the things I've learned. Perhaps they are of value to others thinking of using a coupon system.
1) If a customer hasn't bought from you in a long time, they may not like being contacted. They may have forgotten about the original purchase and think they are being spammed.
To deal with this, I made sure all my emails are fully can spam compliant and even built in a remove system so people can opt out of getting coupon emails. They are still registered in the store but will get no more promotional emails.
I also modified the script to contact only people who have made a purchase in the last year.
Am I losing some business this way? Probably... but it keeps the spam cops away.
2) I do not mail coupons to people who have bought in the last 30 days because I do not want them to feel like they just missed out on a deal... especially if they haven't even gotten their order yet.
3) I mail coupons at unpredictable times so customers see them as something special rather than something to wait for. As a corollary to this, I change the discount amount so people who get a coupon don't know when they will get another or if it will be higher or lower... makes for an anticipation of loss of a deal especially of the previous coupon was for a higher discount.
4) Coupons get exercised within 2 days of the mailing even when I run the special for a longer period of time. I have not tested mailing out a 2nd reminder email during say the last 24 hours of the coupon's lifespan so I have no data on what kind of a bump in sales that may make.
Anyone else have any experiences using coupons that they want to share?
I implemented a coupon system into my shopping cart a year ago and here are the things I've learned. Perhaps they are of value to others thinking of using a coupon system.
1) If a customer hasn't bought from you in a long time, they may not like being contacted. They may have forgotten about the original purchase and think they are being spammed.
To deal with this, I made sure all my emails are fully can spam compliant and even built in a remove system so people can opt out of getting coupon emails. They are still registered in the store but will get no more promotional emails.
I also modified the script to contact only people who have made a purchase in the last year.
Am I losing some business this way? Probably... but it keeps the spam cops away.
2) I do not mail coupons to people who have bought in the last 30 days because I do not want them to feel like they just missed out on a deal... especially if they haven't even gotten their order yet.
3) I mail coupons at unpredictable times so customers see them as something special rather than something to wait for. As a corollary to this, I change the discount amount so people who get a coupon don't know when they will get another or if it will be higher or lower... makes for an anticipation of loss of a deal especially of the previous coupon was for a higher discount.
4) Coupons get exercised within 2 days of the mailing even when I run the special for a longer period of time. I have not tested mailing out a 2nd reminder email during say the last 24 hours of the coupon's lifespan so I have no data on what kind of a bump in sales that may make.
Anyone else have any experiences using coupons that they want to share?
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