Coupons are a great way to engage your customers and keep them up to date on your latest products or promotions. Unlike traditional paper coupons, mobile coupons can be customized to your customers’ preferences and schedules. They are often distributed through SMS, MMS, Bluetooth, and other mobile means. This means that consumers can be sent timely, personalized offers that they’re much more likely to redeem. However, mobile coupons need to be carefully planned and constructed with care or they may just end up being another deleted message.
Here are several effective strategies to help you increase your mobile coupon redemption rates:
1. Send mobile coupons at the right time
Choosing the right time of day to send a mobile discount code is key to getting the coupon opened, read, and actually redeemed in the store.
Early to mid-morning is ideal to send out coupons for both small-ticket items like discounts on coffee or fast food as well as bigger purchases like BOGO deals at a store that customers may go to after work. Many people check their phones first thing in the morning and the coupons they receive can help them plan out their day.
Most people do their routine shopping in the late afternoon when they get off from work. This is the best time to send out coupons for groceries, clothing, and other household goods. By evening, people are looking for deals on restaurants or take-out, or are surfing the web at home and looking for online-onxly offers.
2. Geo-target your customers
By using proximity technology such as Beacons, you can deliver an incentive to drive nearby customers into your store, or upon store entry beam an interactive map of the store right to your customer’s smartphone, showing them the location of of featured items. Sending relevant coupons or offers while shoppers are in or near your location can significantly increase your redemption rate.
3. Offer your customers something of real value
Customers are more likely to use mobile coupons if they are for something that’s perceived as being high value. “Free gift with purchase” deals are often ignored because customers suspect that the store is just trying to get rid of its old or unwanted stock (and this is often the case!). BOGO offers are much more favorably received because the customers are getting a discount on something they actually want. They also appreciate coupons for products related to a recent purchase, such as 50% off ink when they buy a new printer.
4. Be clear and concise
One hazard of electronic coupons is the limited screen space of mobile devices. Customers don’t have the patience to read a block of small-font text buried within a data-consuming graphic. Keep your decorations to a minimum, offer links to pictures or detailed product descriptions, and clearly state the deal at the top of the coupon.
5. Offer different coupons for email and SMS
Many businesses are now offering both email and SMS marketing lists that feature exclusive deals. SMS coupons are more likely to be instantly viewed and are better for short-term promotions or higher valued discounts. Email coupons are less effective for time-sensitive deals but have fewer of the physical limitations of SMS advertising.
Remember, the power of mobile is that it’s accessible, digital, and timely. Getting the mobile coupon experience right for the end user is key to higher mobile coupon redemption rates.