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What Are the Best Discount Strategies to Build for an Income Stream?

Every startup needs a strategy.

By Chrissy LouisPublished 4 years ago 6 min read
What Are the Best Discount Strategies to Build for an Income Stream?
Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash

Successful brands are well-aware of the importance of discounts in boosting sales, enhancing satisfaction, and heightening brand awareness.

Discounts have always been an effective strategy to incentivize the target audience and entice potential business prospects. Even though discounting is not a new concept, it generates significant sales and revenues. Whether it is a multi-national brand or a local business, broader audience acquisition and retention are critical.

Retention is a vital key component for startups. As we look for different methods to innovate startups, there are 18 Highly-Effective Discount Strategies for promotion that startups can use. Cost-effective strategies that help reduce expenses and increase revenues thus increasing profits. As startups learn how to strategize, brand loyalty, customer retention, and business sustainability increases.

So, before you start with crafting discounting strategies, go through our compiled list and maximize your sales:

1. Attract new visitors with special offers:

There is a high possibility that a new visitor might not be up for purchasing for the first time. Offering discount codes on the first visit is not always an effective strategy to convert a first-time visitor into a regular customer. In order to enable the buyer’s journey of the first-time visitor, ask for a smaller commitment like sharing an email address to avail discount code.

2. Target a particular audience group:

Never let the first visit of a potential prospect go to waste — plan and execute. In order to find out more about the new visitors, make sure to leverage the benefits of online cookies. Place the cookies in the browser of unique visitors and keep track of their buying preferences and critical information. It also allows you to keep a check on first-time visitors and returning visitors to tweak your discounting offers and campaigns.

3. Personalization of discount copy:

When it comes to keeping the audience engaged with your offered discounts, making your offer exclusive to them is an effective strategy. Personalize your discount copy to get your message across and maintain relevance. Tailor the content of your discount in a way that relates to what your target audience is looking for.

4. Create a reason for discount availability:

The best way to heighten acceptability for your offered discount is to give the buyers to avail it. People often try to rationalize what they purchase and invest their money into. Giving them reason would simply count in your increased revenues. No matter how apparent the reason for getting a discount is, nobody wants to miss out on a good offer.

5. Create a sense of urgency:

Another way to capitalize on discounts is to reduce the time limit. A limited time offer develops a sense of urgency among the potential prospects. Making the discounted price available for a short time creates the anticipation of missing out on the money-saving offer. Nobody wants to miss the pleasure of getting a high-quality product at a discounted price.

6. Sell value through the newsletter:

In case you are not up for giving out discounts to first-time visitors, newsletter signup might help you expand on customer base. Keeping your potential customer updated with what’s new with your products might result in lead conversion. A tailored newsletter copy can add value to your newsletter signup list.

7. Reward your loyal customers:

If you have years’ old loyal customers or customers that frequently engage with your brand, a reward program is excellent in retention strategy. An efficient way to do that is to personalize discount offers on the basis of purchase records. The value of rewards depends on the points gained. The higher the points earned, the better the rewards gained.

8. Free shipping options:

Your loyal customers are an invaluable business asset, and there are multiple ways to reward them. Another great way to respect customers’ loyalty is to offer them free shipping and delivery options. Provide the loyalty club members with distinct features on delivery and shipping services.

9. Capitalize during holidays:

In today’s world, most of the potential customers prefer online shopping over offline purchasing methods. Especially during the holiday seasons, many customers visit online shopping platforms for shopping gifts. Make sure to put up lucrative yet customer-benefitting holiday promotions on your online platform to double-up your revenues and profits. Guide your first-time visitors to great offers and maximize your site’s traffic.

10. Make the most out of your content in holidays:

Discounted offers and holiday specials are not the only way to take advantage of the holiday season. Another lead-generating technique to boost sales is to upgrade the onsite content. Publish holiday-related blogs and guides to inspire sales. Provide offer suggestions and product endorsements to guide the visitors to your official site. Offer free guides to increase the like ability of acquiring new business prospects.

11. Leverage the first-come, first-serve policy:

There is no doubt that customers don’t want to miss out on new and trending things. The sense of missing outcomes is convenient when it comes to launching a new product. Numerous stores and brands opt for pre-order discounts to market their newly launched product. However, make sure not to offer huge discounts on new products as it can degrade that product’s value.

12. Decide on discount type:

When it comes to strategizing for discounted offers, make sure to determine the type of discount. You could either offer discounts in dollar amounts or an as small percentage of the price. Choose the option that benefits your highest perceived value. For instance, a 20% discount and $5 give the customer the same savings, but 20% sounds more convincing. Experiment with discounts and figure out which type of deal works best for your target customer group.

13. “Few-items-left” technique:

Leveraging scarcity to develop a sense of urgency often leads the customer to order the product regardless of discount. The tactic is powered by the simple psychology of fear of loss. Knowing that one could lose a certain item threatens the freedom of choice, limiting our options. Such fear results in wanting the product more, even if one has to pay full price.

14. Minimization of abandoned carts:

69.80% is the average rate of online shopping cart abandonment. One of the major reasons for cart abandonment is the inclusion of unanticipated charges. These largely unavoidable cart abandonments are due to the behavior of online shoppers. Where many shoppers browse for window shopping, most of them add items to Wishlist without making any purchases. To recover the profits, offer discounts to abandoning shoppers.

15. Referrals from existing customers:

Referral marketing is an effective marketing strategy used for promotion. It helps in the efficient expansion of the customer base. Discounts are offered to those who suggest the product or item to a friend. These discounts offer benefits to both the referrer and referral.

16. Visitors’ retargeting:

The simplest yet effective way to increase sales is to send a personalized message to your potential visitors. Whether it is social media advertising or email marketing, sending custom offers is a proven method to drive traffic and sales. Craft a creative copy to send visitor-exclusive offers.

17. Provide discounts on subscriptions:

The modern-day customer values convenience more than anything. Most of the customers prefer one-time purchases over long-time subscriptions. If you want to increase your subscription, offer a discount on subscribing and maximize customer retention. The more you focus on the convenience of consumers, the higher the customer lifetime value.

18. Keep up with the event attendees:

If you attend events for product promotion, make sure to stay in touch and keep track of the attendees. Send personalized emails to attendees to promote the similar products you promoted at the event. Attach the link to these products and keep track of it. Include craft and incorporate a distinct campaign to your website for such visitors and make the most of the discounts.

Discounting is often regarded as the top priority pricing strategy for retailers. However, executing and planning an effective discount strategy yields both favorable and unfavorable consequences. While cutting down on prices could entice the target customers, the wrong implementation could bring down the desired profits and revenues. For that very reason, it is crucial to plan your promotion and craft a well-thought-out objective before execution.

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About the Creator

Chrissy Louis

Enjoys researching, writing, and modeling all things creative.

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