Topic
Offers & pricing
Sales, price increases, bundles and launches that protect your margin.
How do you announce a price increase without losing loyal customers?
Tell them straight, in a plain message from the founder, with a hard date and a short reason. Pair the rise with something that's got better, and give loyal customers a way to keep paying today's price, like subscribing or stocking up before the date. Done this way, customers often thank you for it.
Run Black Friday as two sales, not one
Split Black Friday into two phases. First, an early-access sale for your email and SMS list only, in early November, with its own offer. Then the public sale, with ads, automatic discounts and the whole site behind it. You get two things to talk about, cheaper attention, and the people most likely to buy get rewarded first.
Launch your Black Friday gift with purchase as a full-priced product first
A free gift that nobody has ever seen for sale has no perceived value. Launch it weeks or months before your sale at a believable full price, with real fanfare, then bring it back as the gift in cart. Your spend threshold then feels like a genuine win, and you can run a smaller discount instead of racing everyone to 40 or 50% off.
What should your Black Friday to New Year campaign calendar look like?
Plan Q4 as a run of moments, each with its own offer and message: VIP early access at the start of November, the public sale mid-month, Black Friday weekend, a Cyber Monday extension, a Christmas offer, shipping cut-offs, Boxing Day and New Year. Add something new in December and again in January. The goal is to come out of January at a higher baseline than you went in.
Questions on Offers & pricing
- Can raising prices increase conversion rate?
Yes, sometimes. You put the price up and the conversion rate goes up, because the psychology of the new number works better than the lower price did.
- Should a new online store offer free shipping or charge flat rates?
Do both. Charge a simple flat rate on smaller orders and give free shipping over a set order value. Then leave it alone for three to six months.
- How long after a price increase should I wait before judging the results?
Give it 60 to 90 days, and don't read much into the first month. Work out your average time to purchase, double it, and that's roughly when the data settles enough to tell you anything.
- How should I price an online course?
Anchor it to what the same time with you would cost one-on-one. Work out how many hours someone will spend doing the material, multiply that by your session rate, and present that as the value.
- What promotions can I run in quiet months without training customers to wait for discounts?
Keep a small library of about four simple offers and run one in any month without a big gifting event. Send them only to people who haven't bought recently, so your regulars never learn to wait for a deal.
- How do I raise average order value without running a flash sale?
Run a standing spend-and-save offer and put it in your ads. Plenty of stores already have one sitting in the cart that nobody has ever advertised.