Retail voucher searches on the up

December 3, 2008
by Mark Johnson

I know people are probably fed up with the constant talk of the “R” word, but it will definitely be playing a major role in how people spend over this festive period. I mentioned in my last post that 86% of shoppers will research Christmas shopping through the internet before buying in-store and that this year more than any other, people will be looking for the cheapest deal.

We only have to look at Google Trends to see the growth in searches for these voucher codes and the amount of websites advertising on the keywords. I wonder how many of the companies know their vouchers are on these sites, and how much traffic they drive as a result? Who could forget the Threshers’ discount voucher in 2006.

A cock up or viral marketing triumph? I wonder what returns Threshers could have got had they planned for such a stampede? (one so big it brought their website down for several days, meaning many voucher holders were unable to locate their nearest store and sales assistants overworked by the increase in demand)…

With customers looking for a bargain this Christmas I believe online vouchers and voucher codes could be very important to the marketing mix. Used smartly, they could drive more consumers to your site and the increase in goods sold would offset the discount given. It will be interesting to see if any companies work with the websites that show their codes to help promote them, or whether they’d rather not so many people knew about them. This year is definitely the year where some will get great returns whilst others see their margins shrink.

0 Comments