How do you make more sales in your ecommerce site?

Have you ever tried using coupon codes or other promotional strategies within your website to increase sales?

They can work really well if you use them right or send them to the right people!

In order for a promotion to work well, you need two things:

1. Urgency
2. Appeal

Set your coupons and promotions to expire quickly so people take action and buy something.

Make your coupons attractive so it’s a no brainer to spend money at your shop.

Here’s a coupon code report from my own site.

You can have a look at what works best and try it out for yourself!

We’ll go through the five types of coupon codes or promotions I’ve used here to make tons of extra sales!

1. The Upsell

The best revenue generating promotion here is the one named Rainbow Lollipop that brought in an extra $1,600.

This was an upsell item that I added to my checkout page.

The item was on a 20% discount but it only appeared when a customer already had something in her shopping cart.

Many people who were already considering on buying something decided to splurge and buy the extra item on sale.

The Targets and Walmarts do it because it works. You should try it too.

Your ecommerce site may not have an upsell feature, but it’s possible you might find an add-on or module to install.

2. The Email Incentive

Building an email list should be a priority for any small business owner online.

One way to build your subscriber base quickly is by offering a special promotion just for people who sign up to your mailing list.

There are various incentives you can offer as a product based shop.

I use a free shipping coupon, which you can see in the picture above. It brings in tons of sales!

People love free shipping.

In fact, they might love free shipping more than percentage off coupon codes.

3. The Loyal Reader Promo

In this post, I explained how you can use autoresponders to make more sales with little effort.

People who have become subscribers to my mailing list are slowly fed a sequence of emails from me.

These emails are sent automatically and are spread a week apart.

The point of this email sequence is to get my subscribers to know, like and trust me – which is key in marketing and selling anything.

The very last email in that sequence is a surprise. I offer my subscribers a 20% off coupon code to reward them for opening my emails and sticking with me for so long.

This rewards readers who have opened and read my emails and the guys that unsubscribed didn’t get in on this fun part!

This autoresponder strategy is one that I teach how to do in Handmade Marketing That Works.

This coupon code brought in $830.96 in sales that otherwise wouldn’t have happened.

For being an automatic system, that’s a pretty good deal!

4. Referrals

I use Referral Candy (affiliate link alert) to automatically invite my customers to spread the word about my jewelry business.

Here’s how it works:

• My customers are given a 15% coupon code their friends can use if they shop with me
• My customers receive an 8% commission in cash for orders their friends make

It works pretty well considering it’s brought in $830 in sales to my shop!

There’s some set up involved with Referral Candy but once you get it going, it’s hands off for you.

5. New Products + Seasonal Sales

The fifth best coupon code was the Valentine’s one. I made almost $800 in one day from doing this sale.

It was for a new design that I was just making available to my website for the first time.

I sent an email to my subscribers and offered them a coupon code for first dibs.

Setting up a promotion that’s timely and seasonal can do a lot for your business.

Consider which special occasions through the year you can capitalize on.

Take action

Which of these have you tried before or would like to try out?

Do you have other types of promotions you can share?

Leave me a note in the comments below!