What is promotion? Definition, benefits, categories, and examples

Promotions, also known as sales promotions, are a group of marketing techniques used to increase demand, brand awareness, and sales of goods or services. Typically, companies run limited-time promotions through a variety of channels, including websites, email campaigns, and social media. They have engaging graphics, compelling text, and realistic goals to connect with your target audience. Regardless of your industry, type of business, or company size, sales promotion techniques have been used successfully for a long time and should work for you too. Now its benefits have been explored in more detail.

The meaning of promotions (sales promotions)

In addition to quick gains and promising leads, activity is also very important. The most effective strategies span the entire sales funnel and focus on very specific goals based on the stage of the buyer’s journey.

Here are some illustrations:

Add new customers.

Offer discounts, free trials, or free items to attract new customers. Ideally, they will love your solution and be your support forever. Introduce a new product or service. By allowing customers to test new products at a reduced price, you can gain positive reviews and feedback from a wider audience.

Quickly read the inventory.

Whether it’s due to seasonality, poor performance, or last-minute efforts to meet end-of-quarter sales goals, many companies use promotions to get rid of outdated inventory.

Strengthen lasting loyalty.

Promotions help maintain relationships with regular customers by keeping them happy, interested, and informed about new products and updates. But there is still much to do. The truth is that promotions are just as beneficial to businesses as they are to actual customers.

Campaigns — “Delegates”

There was a problem with the inventory. It’s important to remember that many so-called advertising “mistakes” are simply “strategic mistakes.” Promotions are often beneficial for both the company and the customer. In short, a lot can go wrong if you use insufficient or inaccurate data to make campaign decisions, or if you don’t prioritize customer needs.

Ok, let’s now see the Possible disadvantages include:

-Price surprise, and price sensitivity.

-Alienate customers, an income limit.

-There is also the danger of falling into the “sale trap”, where a discount is the only sure way to close a sale.

In theory, if you run too many promotions, customers will expect them and engage with you only during the promotion period. You end up in a cycle where you are forced to invest in short-term discount strategies at the expense of long-term growth.

Campaigns are the foundation of a campaign portfolio. Discovering sales tactics that appeal to your target market will help you build long-lasting relationships with your users. In addition, you must provide value to customers that are relevant to your area of ​​expertise. This helps generate new leads. Because a campaign encourages information sharing among social groups related to your business, it can improve your product image. For example, if you sell training soccer shoes, you will spread the word among soccer enthusiasts.

Re-engage your current audience. People who sign up for a brand’s email newsletters often receive sales offers. Keeping your audience engaged. Engaging with your brand is essential to building loyalty.

Salary increase. Although they have to lower prices to do this, promotions can help businesses increase the number of items they sell. Of course, lowering the price is not enough, customers must have your product, and discounts are just an incentive to buy. Increase brand awareness. Since people are more likely to talk about companies that offer benefits and save money, promotions are a way to build your brand. Campaigns can do that. While the primary goal of advertising is to increase demand for a particular product, there are other important goals you can achieve. You can create a successful advertising strategy by knowing them.

Launch a new product. If you want to grow and turn your small café into a bakery, you need new clientele. Adding a free cookie to every cup of coffee or asking guests to set the price from time to time can be an effective way to attract new customers.

Attract new customers. Since it allows you to expand your business, it should be your long-term goal. By researching your competitor’s products and strengths, you can offer something more valuable to your potential customers, who may also be your competitor’s customers. Stay awake! Researching and evaluating your competitors not only helps you attract new customers but also helps you continuously improve your products and services. Encourage repeat business from existing customers. Acquiring new customers is always more difficult than increasing the number of purchases from existing customers. Tailor your approach to each client, this will encourage repeat business. So it’s only natural that customers spread the word about your brand.

Off-Season Sale. Summer is when people are most likely to buy things like swimsuits, boats, tents, air conditioners, and refrigerators, but you should consider specific marketing techniques to sell these products year-round. Offer limited-time offers and other marketing gimmicks.

Start the cleaning operation. They are especially popular in early summer and early winter. Retailers often hold full-scale promotions where customers can buy items from previous collections at extremely low prices because they have to get rid of that collections. You can use different activities to achieve your goals. There are many ways to run a successful marketing campaign, but using the example of a coffee mug, let’s highlight some of the most popular.

Price negotiations. These are temporary price reductions, such as 20% off weekly coffee.

Loyalty reward system. So when customers buy coffee, they earn points or credits. For example, if they get 10 points, they get a free cup of coffee.

Bonus package available. By paying the original price, the customer can buy more of the product. For example, they pay $1 for a cup of coffee and get free candy, which makes them feel good and come back.

Return. These strategies are designed to increase brand awareness. It must offer something free in exchange for personal data for future marketing. For example, offering a free cup of coffee in exchange for a phone number or email. You can then use that number or email to promote new sales, send text messages and emails with updates and news, and more.

Coupon. The coffee is sold at full price with a 5% coupon added to your next purchase. Get coupons anytime, anywhere. This applies to coupons received via SMS on mobile devices. Customers must show their smartphone coupon to receive the discount.

Sampling. Companies that opt ​​for this type of promotion offer product samples, such as the first cups of coffee, to promote new flavors.

Using the tips and less-used strategies in this section, you can increase your sales without putting in a lot of work.

Discount. This method has a long history. Small businesses and large businesses alike use this tactic to increase sales. The fact that rebates benefit both customers and merchants is one of the reasons why it remains so popular to this day. Customers can buy more items at discounts, and sellers can free up warehouse space for new arrivals. Remember that a typical discount should be between 5% and 20%, because customers will not even notice a discount of less than 5%, but a discount of more than 20% will make them wary of your brand.

The offer will end soon. This tactic works better than deep discounts. Marketers use this tactic to create a sense of urgency and fear of missing out. Customers have a full day to take advantage of this offer. For this technique to be effective, you need to promote your campaign across all the channels you use. As a result, your website traffic and sales will increase.

Seasonal discounts. To save money, people often buy air conditioners in winter and ski clothes in summer. We strongly recommend doing seasonal promotions as it can be very difficult to sell products out of season. Offer discounts on previous favorites and don’t forget to spread the word about your destination on social media and email.

“1 1 = 3”. Marketing gimmicks like “buy one, get one free” and “buy two, get one free” are not uncommon. If you use events like these to sell products at a discount, you can save money by shopping with friends. Using this strategy, retailers can significantly increase sales by supporting clearance sales.

Christmas sales. Sales increase during holidays such as Valentine’s Day, Christmas, New Year’s Eve, Halloween, and International Women’s Day. People pay a lot when buying gifts for friends and family. Start your holiday campaign early and spend money on email, PPC, social media, and other channels. This will result in increased traffic to your website.

A gift. Choose this strategy if you are a beginner or about to launch a new product, because who doesn’t like free stuff? You can use it to quickly reach large audiences, increase brand awareness, and aggregate user-generated content, which is especially beneficial for all types of businesses. Offer users a free 7-day trial of your product, and start a promotion where customers who spend $100 or more get a gift or free sample with every purchase.

Competition. Contests are a great way to increase user engagement, brand awareness, and sales. You can ask your audience to come up with a slogan that resonates with your company, a new piece of artwork or ad copy, or an innovative use for your product. Make sure the prize is commensurate with the effort required to enter the competition.

Bonus points. People like to rate the brands they choose, so you should reward customers who buy from you often. So, with this approach, you can start building customer loyalty. Customers should earn points by redeeming or spending a certain amount. Let them spend those points on products later.

Fees are not included. Usually, merchants organize a one-day sale where customers can buy everything at a fixed price. Users are often seduced by these prices and unable to overcome the feeling of loss. An annual product approval could be the goal. You can set fixed prices for each product category in your store. Choose a sweater for $49.99, jeans for $89.99, and a coat for $144.99. This access is successful.

First purchase coupon. People always take their time before investing in a new business, especially when it comes to expensive purchases. Offer unique incentives to get them to consider buying as soon as possible. You can include a coupon in your email welcoming new visitors to get them 15% or 30% off their first purchase. Keep this tempting offer for a few days to improve performance.

Free delivery. Users often leave your site without purchasing due to expensive shipping options. You can run a limited-time promotion where they get their order for free if they spend a certain amount of money to return the lead. If you sell in the middle price range, don’t set this fixed amount too high. Otherwise, no one will be fooled by this trick.

Now that you know about the different advertising strategies, choose the one that will benefit your business the most and try using some software or app to create a successful email, SMS, or Facebook marketing campaign.

You can undoubtedly test and implement some for little or no cost. As we have already discussed, there are some advantages to using shares. Then it’s time to choose an advertising idea and bring it to life!

Good luck!