Due to the increasing competition in every industry, consumer sales promotions have become extremely important for businesses these days. Sales promotions are the strategies that businesses use to attract customers, boost sales, and achieve other short-term business goals. Brand encourage their target audience and customers to make more purchases by offering them assured rewards in return. There are different types of sales promotion techniques that brands use for different purposes, such as free gift with purchase, exclusive discounts, welcome gifts, and many more.
However, when it comes to running sales promotions to expand your customer base, there is a set of specific sales promotion strategies that you can use. Here are some effective sales promotion activities to attract new customers:
1. Free Samples
Consumers are often afraid of spending money on new products as long as they are not sure about the quality. But how will your target audience know the quality of your product if they never get to use it? This is why offering free product samples can be a great idea. You can partner with some popular brands and get your free samples distributed along with their products. Whenever a customer purchases their product, he/she gets to try your product for free. If you run a service-based business, you can offer free trials in the same way.
2. Welcome Benefits
If you want to turn your leads or the registered users of your online store into customers, offering welcome discounts or freebies would be an effective way to do it. You can offer a great discount or some valuable freebies to all your first-time buyers. If distributing free samples seems an expensive idea, you can prefer this.
This encourages users to buy your product at a much lower price than its actual cost. If they like it, they will definitely repurchase it at the actual price as well. Your goal here is to attract new customers and encourage them to make their first purchase. Offering welcome gifts is one of the best ways to do it.
3. BOGO Deals
Consumers may be interested in your products, but not purchasing them due to high prices or any other reason. By running a ‘Buy One Get One’ offer on your products, you can encourage them to make a purchase. Consumers are more likely to purchase when they get such offers. It doesn’t only help you attract new customers but also boost your sales through existing customers. If you have a large stock of products that you want to clear soon, running a BOGO sale would be a very good way to do it.
4. Social Media Giveaways
If you have business accounts on social media platforms, you might have many more followers than your customer base. The people who follow you are obviously interested in your products or services. But how do you encourage them to engage more and try your products? One great way to do this is by running a social media giveaway contest. You can run a contest where three random purchasers are chosen as winners and receive exclusive prizes, such as electronics, lifestyle products, etc.
The prizes need not be necessarily from your brand. But to be eligible for the contest, your followers need to make at least one purchase above a certain amount. It will not only boost your sales but also increase engagement on your social media pages.
5. Scratch n Win Program
Involving gamification tactics in your sales promotion program is always a good idea. You can run a scratch-and-win win contest on your online e-commerce website or app. To encourage more and more people to participate, make sure to keep the eligibility simple. You can allow every registered customer of your online store to participate in the contest and win the prizes, whether they have made a purchase or not.
Just keep in mind that your goal is to onboard new customers and hence, you need to target those who have not yet bought your products. If they win a good discount coupon or freebie under the contest, they might be encouraged to make their first purchase.
Even your existing customers will be encouraged to make repeat purchases if they get to win discounts under such contests. Sales promotion companies like RewardPort can implement and manage such gamified promotions for your business, keeping the interests of your target audience in mind. Apart from ‘scratch2win,’ you get various other gamification options on RewardPort, such as ‘Spin to Win’ programs, sweepstakes, etc.
6. Product Bundles
Consumers are more likely to purchase product bundles on discounts rather than buying the same products separately. Offering product bundles at a collectively discounted price can have multiple advantages. It encourages customers to try more of your products. Let us understand how. Suppose you offer five products, but most consumers only prefer three of them. Offering product bundles of all five products at a discounted price will motivate them to try the other two products as well. This will not only attract more customers but also help you boost the sales for your least-sold products.
7. Flash Sales
Flash sales are discount offers that you run for a limited time period. Such offers aim to boost sales within a short period of time while attracting new customers at the same time. When you run a very good offer for a very short period, it creates a sense of urgency among your customers and they end up purchasing more than they had planned. You can even attract new customers with such sales. Many consumers wait for sales to buy a product of their choice. As soon as you run a flash sale on that product, they will try to purchase it as soon as possible so that they do not miss out on such a good deal.
8. Free Delivery & Returns
To minimize the fear of risk in your customers, you can offer free delivery and returns. Many consumers might be interested in your products but not purchase them due to the high delivery and return charges associated with them. By waiving these charges, you can allow your customers to order and try your product without any risk. This is one of the most effective sales promotion activities to consider if you aim to expand your customer base.
Choose RewardPort as Your Sales Promotion Partner
When running sales promotions for your business, you don’t only have to focus on attracting more customers but also ensure that these strategies are profitable. You should not spend more than your profits on promotions. For this, you need a well-planned sales promotion strategy that works for your business.
RewardPort, being the top sales promotion company in India, can help you select the best consumer sales promotions keeping the interests of your target audience in mind. The marketing team at RewardPort ensures that the sales promotion program aligns with the objectives of your business. With rewards starting from as low as Rs. 10, you can run an effective Loyalty program for your customers while keeping them engaged with the gamified promotions.
Frequently Asked Questions
1. What are the key elements of sales promotion?
The key elements of sales promotions are personal selling, advertising, direct marketing, and public relations.
2. What are the key benefits of using sales promotions?
Some of the primary benefits of using sales promotions include a boost in sales, higher customer engagement, better customer satisfaction rates, higher customer acquisition rates, etc.
3. What is the difference between a sales promotion and a discount?
Sales promotions are the strategies that businesses use to boost sales or achieve other marketing objectives. However, discount is just a type of sales promotion technique.