You’re giving away too much too soon

Imagine you went to a store to look around and check their products. You haven’t even opened your mouth yet, when suddenly, two sales clerks come to you and announce that whatever you buy from them is 10% off already!

This is exactly what happens whenever your website immediately shows popups with discounts to everyone who goes to your website. (Want to create better customer experience on your website? I talk about it in my video here.)

As a customer who’s offered a discount immediately, would you feel:

a) happy because you got a discount, or,

b) a bit confused (and kind of skeptical) because the store’s already giving away 10% off even though you’ve never engaged with them before?

Sure, you may feel happy about saving some money, but in the back of your mind, you’d be having second thoughts about the product’s quality because the store seems like it’s giving away too much too soon, right?

Also, as a business owner, you don’t want to give away too much too soon. Sure, you can raise your conversion rate by offering an incentive, but at what cost?  If you offer discounts all the time, your customers would naturally expect them and stop paying full price altogether!
Isn’t it better for you to give discounts at certain specific triggers and timing, rather than giving discounts all the time, every time, to everyone who goes to your website? Here’s how you can strategically apply discounts to your marketing platforms to keep you and your customer happy.

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1. Log out of your admin dashboard and open your website in incognito/private mode.

Simulate what new visitors experience in your website. When are things popping up in your website? Are your pop-ups intrusive in your customer’s eyes? How about the close button – is it easily seen or do you need to pop a vein first before you can close your pop-up?

Find out when your discount pop-ups are being triggered. Make sure you also know what behaviors your new visitors need to take before your pop-ups are triggered.

2. If you want to use a discount as a lead magnet, use an exit-intent pop-up as a Hail Mary pass.

In my last video about creating better website experiences, I talk about creating relevant popups with trigger. An exit-intent pop-up is a great example. Exit-intent pop-ups are effective in recovering 10%-15% of lost visitors. You display it whenever your visitor is about to leave your website.

This way, they’re encouraged to stay longer, continue browsing and hopefully avail themselves of what you’re offering: whether it may be a discount, a free shipping code, or other incentives you’d like to give them.

Alternatively, you can also trigger your pop-up to appear whenever your customer performs a specific behavior. Maybe they’ve spent x amount of time in the site, or they’ve already scrolled down to a certain percentage of the page.

3. Use the Heatmap Method to determine the level of discount you’d offer to your site visitors

You don’t need to offer the same value to everyone. Find out how engaged they are with you first.

For example, a website visitor who’s more engaged with you is more likely to buy from you. At the time they engage with you, they’re already “warm” enough, so it’s okay for you to offer a lesser discount value (5% off instead of 15%).

Other examples of “warm” leads are those who recently subscribed to your email list or those who already bought from you.

On the other hand, “less warm” leads are those with low level of engagement: perhaps they subscribed to your list, but they’ve never bought from you, or they bought from you already but it’s been a year. In this case, you’re better off offering a higher discount value or even free shipping just so you can encourage them to do business with you again.

The less engaged your visitor is, the higher the value you should offer to them.

That’s it from me today! Biggest takeaway from this discussion: go through your website, find out what you’re offering to your visitors, and make sure that what you’re offering isn’t hurting your company’s gross profit. With these tips you’ve learned today, you now know that a win-win scenario is definitely possible for you and your customers.

See you next week! Cheers.

Photo by Pablo Heimplatz on Unsplash