Discount coupons – what they are and how they can increase sales in an affiliate program

Discount codes in an affiliate program

Discount codes are made available to customers for free in order to encourage them to shop in a store. It’s worth noting that discount codes not only generate results, but also provide valuable data – their effectiveness can easily be measured, analyzed, and optimized. Thanks to this, the store can test different strategies, segment customers, and precisely select the forms of promotion that work best.

Can coupons, discounts, special offers, and promotions become boring for customers? No. When well thought out, they still work like a magnet. Thanks to discount codes, ordinary purchases turn into a special opportunity available only to a selected group.

When a customer shops online and sees a limited-time discount code, they’re more motivated to speed up their purchase decision. It also turns out that in such situations they tend to buy significantly more than they would without the discount. The value of the shopping cart soars!

What are discount coupons in e-commerce?

Discount coupons (or coupon codes) are price reductions offered by online stores. They lower the value of the shopping cart in an online store. Usually, these are time-limited offers that allow customers to reduce the value of their order. They may apply not only to the value of the products ordered, but can also, for example, offer free delivery or a discount on the next purchase.

Providing discount coupons is not a cost, but a profitable investment in the development of your store. It lets you increase sales, build relationships with customers, and expand your reach through marketing partnerships at the same time.

Discount coupons – why it’s worth offering them

• they reactivate customers who haven’t made a purchase for a long time

• they shape the image of a brand that is friendly to consumers. Even unused coupons that reduce the order value work in your store’s favor. Customers appreciate the gesture. In their eyes, you gain an advantage over competitors who didn’t offer a discount

• they motivate publishers to be active in your affiliate program

• promotional coupons are an attractive hook for new and returning customers

• they help you clear out overstocked inventory

• they stimulate purchases best in low shopping seasons

Discount coupons are one of the most popular ways to reach customers. Below, we analyze why it’s worth including them in your e-commerce strategy and what mistakes to avoid when passing them on to publishers.

Discount coupons in an affiliate program – the best way for fast distribution

Discount coupons and all other promotions are shared by the advertiser from the advertiser panel in our service, in the Discount codes >> Add discount code section. We then distribute them to publishers through our internal communication system.

After submitting a code, you do not receive an e-mail confirmation that the code has been added. However, at any time you can check which codes you added and when, in the Discount codes >>> List of my codes section.

To add discount coupons, you need to provide a few key pieces of information:

• Message title – this is the title that will be displayed to publishers. It should be short and specific, for example: All cosmetics 20% off with code XYZ.

• Type of information shared – choose the type of promotion: discount code, sale, free delivery, contest, etc.

• Share for program – if you have several affiliate programs, select here which program you want to assign the coupon to.

• Message content – this should include all additional details of the promotion, e.g. that it does not apply to already discounted products or that it cannot be combined with other promotions.

• Discount code – in this field, you enter the actual discount code, if you are sharing information about a promotion that uses a code. 🙂

• Value – the monetary or percentage value of the discount coupon.

• Link to the promotion/code/sale page – if the promotional campaign you are sharing with publishers has a dedicated landing page, paste it here. If not, you can simply paste a link to the store’s homepage.

• Valid from/to – the date range during which the discount coupons you share with publishers are active.

• I want to share only with a selected publisher – if you want to provide an exclusive discount coupon for just one publisher, click here and select them from the list.

Discount coupons – what you can gain with them

Discount coupons are one of the most effective sales tools in e-commerce, and their role in an online store’s marketing strategy can hardly be overstated. Above all, they directly contribute to increasing sales – customers are more willing to buy when they receive a real price benefit. The simple fact that they can save money works psychologically as a purchase trigger, which often breaks through internal hesitation and leads to finalizing the transaction.

Discount coupons for new customers

For new users, coupons act as an incentive and a “ticket in” to the brand. The first purchase is often the biggest hurdle, and a welcome discount can be a powerful nudge to make it happen.

In the case of customers who have abandoned their shopping carts, a coupon sent in a reminder email can encourage them to return and complete the purchase – many studies show that a well-chosen discount can recover a significant portion of lost transactions.

Discount coupons for loyal customers

Coupons also work very well for building loyalty. When a customer receives a discount for their birthday or a code for a repeat purchase, they feel appreciated and come back to the store. This strengthens their attachment to the brand and makes them more likely to recommend it to others. This mechanism fits perfectly with affiliate marketing and influencer marketing – unique codes assigned to creators not only motivate their communities to buy, but also make it possible to precisely track campaign performance.

A well-designed minimum order threshold to unlock a discount (e.g. -10% on orders over 200 PLN) effectively increases the average order value. To “qualify” for the discount, customers add more products to their cart. From a marketing perspective, coupons also create a sense of a special deal – their limited validity period or limited quantity activates the FOMO effect, the fear of missing out. That’s a powerful psychological trigger that works very quickly.

Maximizing the benefits of discount coupons

Internet users look out for discount codes eagerly 🙂 No wonder online stores bend over backwards to offer a discount that will make their offer stand out. Likewise, publishers – especially coupon and deal sites – compete for exclusive discount codes, ideally on an exclusive basis.

It’s worth preparing properly for discount code distribution so that, with the help of publishers, you can acquire new customers and retain returning ones.

• Reward your most active publishers – with unique, exclusive codes. This is a favourite motivational tool for publishers, especially small and medium ones. It helps their site grow its reach. Larger publishers, in turn, are happy to place such a code in the best-converting spot on their website. A good practice is to grant exclusive codes to a small group of top-selling publishers – this way you can test whether the offer is attractive to customers and, after some time, decide whether to roll it out more broadly.

• Vary your promotions – repetitive discount coupons don’t feel like a real deal to customers. Review your strategy and check whether your promotions differ from one another. The most common types of offers are percentage discounts, free delivery, a free gift with purchase, and a flat-amount discount.

• Spread promotions out over time – find the sweet spot that lets you distribute discount coupons regularly, but not too often and not too rarely. You want customers not to get bored with constant discounts, but still to eagerly look forward to them.

• Include special occasions, holidays, and seasons – take advantage of the fact that during these times customers are more willing to buy specific products or services.

• Set time-limited coupons for long enough – as long as they’re not tied to specific one-day occasions. A week or two is usually enough for codes to reach publishers and for customers to see them and make a purchase. This way you avoid disappointing blog readers who find out about the promotion only after it has ended.

Provide discount coupons early enough – publishers need time to plan their activities in the affiliate program, especially around holidays or special occasions such as Mother’s Day or Valentine’s Day. If you work with an affiliate network, share information about upcoming discount codes with its team in advance – they’ll help you distribute the codes to publishers.

Discount coupons – best practices

We asked one of the experienced webePartners publishers what else to pay attention to when you want to distribute discount coupons.

– “From our experience, the most effective discounts are between 10 and 30% or between 50 and 100 PLN. From the customer’s point of view, lower percentage values seem ‘not worth it’, whereas higher ones suggest that the product might not be sellable. Of course, everything depends on the type of assortment we offer. The most effective discount codes are those that are unique, available only to a single publisher, although there are exceptions here. Above all, it’s worth adjusting the discount level to the prices in our store,
advises Katarzyna Mróz, Affiliate Manager at PannaCottaGroup, the owner of Kupon.pl. It’s very important that the promotion of a discount code does not coincide in time with another discount campaign in the store. For example, a -15% discount code will not be attractive if at the same time the store is offering a Shopping Night with a -20% discount.”

Discount coupons in affiliate marketing – what to avoid

For the flow of information and codes between the advertiser, the affiliate network, and publishers to be smooth, you should avoid the following mistakes:

• Lack of a clear message
  You should always specify as precisely as possible which products or categories a given code applies to, so publishers have full clarity about what the discount concerns and don’t accidentally mislead their users.

• Sending a code several or a dozen days before it becomes active
  It’s best to add a ready code to the system 1–3 days before it becomes active. This way, publishers won’t lose sight of it and will be able to immediately plan how to promote it on their websites.

• Sending a code that doesn’t work
  It’s crucial to check in your system, before sending, whether the code definitely works, whether there are no typos in the code name, and whether the activation dates are set correctly.

• A large number of codes with the same value for different products in the store
  Quality is always more important than quantity. Too many codes with the same value can have the opposite effect: publishers may feel overwhelmed by “spam” and stop publishing those codes.

• Mutually exclusive discounts
  Sometimes discounts conflict with each other: one gives 7% off everything, another 5% off a selected category, and the promotions don’t stack. You need to be very careful to avoid such situations, because customers who feel unintentionally misled will leave the store very dissatisfied when they don’t receive the discount they expected.

Discount coupons – first aid in a crisis situation

Discount coupons work like a first aid kit for e-commerce 😉 Why this comparison? Apart from the obvious reasons, they can also get the advertiser out of trouble. If you stumble while running your affiliate program, discount codes can quickly save the situation. When relaunching the program, you can use them to encourage publishers to re-engage.

A small image crisis? In addition to a humble attitude and actually fixing the problem, share discount codes and you’ll be able to come out of the situation with your reputation intact.

Although giving out discount codes may look spontaneous from the outside, there is a deliberate strategy behind it. Avoid falling into routine, act in advance, and reward publishers with exclusive discounts, and you’ll see your affiliate program grow.

If you have an idea for a discount code – or, on the contrary, you’re drawing a blank – ask your Affiliate Manager for guidance.