Choose between sale pricing and discount codes, announce your offer, and check your analytics to see what worked.

A promotion plan helps you reach the right shoppers and build an offer that drives sales without cutting into your profits. Start by answering five questions about your goals, then use the rest of this guide to pick the tools that fit your answers:

• Which items do you want to discount?
• How long will the sale run?
• Which shoppers are you targeting: casual visitors, loyal followers, or both?
• Which marketing channels will you use?
• What's your most important goal? For example, clearing back stock, attracting new social media followers, or boosting overall sales.

Tip: Register for our Design tips to increase your store's sales webinar for tools and tips that make your products stand out.

Choose between sale pricing and discounts

You can run promotions two ways: sale pricing and discounts.

Use sale pricing for storewide, no-code savings

Like a "Sale" tag on an item in a retail store, sale pricing promotes discounted items to anyone browsing your store. Sale pricing draws attention to specific items, so it works well for clearing back stock at the end of a season or boosting bookings during slow seasons. Visible savings can also increase conversion by making products more appealing. 

Sale pricing:

• Adds a Sale badge to the product.
• Shows the original price with a strikethrough to highlight savings.
• Applies to every shopper, with no code to enter.
• Gets set manually on each item.

Use discounts for targeted or time-limited offers

Like a "20% off for new students" sale, discounts give you more control over who redeems the offer and when. Because you control the code, you can send a discount to a specific group, like convention attendees, mailing list subscribers, or social media followers. You can also set a duration, which works well for timed promotions like a weekend sale.

Discounts:

• Show the savings at checkout.
• Take an amount or percentage off, or offer free shipping.
• Apply to specific items, categories, or entire orders.
• Require a promo code, or apply automatically on the Commerce Advanced plan.
• Track how often each promo code gets used.

Announce your promotion on your site

After you create the promotion, announce it on your site so shoppers know it exists and know how to redeem it.

Add a Sale category to your discounted products

Add a Sale category to every discounted product. This adds a navigation link on your store page to all items in the category. You can also add the Sale link to your site navigation.

Add a promotional pop-up

A promotional pop-up grabs shoppers' attention when they land on your site. Customize it to match your branding, share the discount code, and add a button that sends visitors to your Sale page.

Add an announcement bar

An announcement bar displays text and a link at the top of your site. It draws attention to the promotion in a less interruptive way than a pop-up.

Add a summary block of sales products

A summary block displays your sale items in a magazine-style layout. Add one to your homepage to show a sample of discounted products, and pair it with a text block for details like "Save 20% on all yoga classes" or "Free shipping with code SHIP."

Turn on limited availability labels

To show shoppers that sale products are running low, turn on limited availability labels. Set an inventory threshold, or turn the labels on for every product in your store. You can use a pre-written label or write your own.

Share your promotion outside your site

To bring visitors to your store, promote your offer through the channels where your audience already is. Marketing integrations can help you attract new customers with savings, or reward existing followers with exclusive codes.

Promote on social media

Sharing links to discounted products on social platforms brings traffic to your site and can spread from your followers to theirs. If you have a blog, create a post announcing the promotion, use product blocks to show off sale items, then push that post to social media.

You can also sell your products on Facebook and Instagram to reach shoppers where they're already browsing.

A store's social media strategy is always a work in progress. Running promotions and measuring the results is how you learn what works for your audience.

Email your mailing list

Squarespace Email Campaigns helps you keep in touch with customers and reward them with offers. Add a newsletter block to any content area, or add a newsletter subscribe option to checkout, then send your subscribers the code and the details.

Create promotional content in the Squarespace app

Use the Marketing Kit in the iOS Squarespace app to make professional-quality content, then add it to your site or share it on social media.

Measure your promotion’s results

Tracking a promotion shows you which channels drive traffic and which offers create the biggest bump in sales.

Track conversion in Squarespace analytics

Use Squarespace analytics to review site traffic, referral sources, and total sales during your promotion. Date filters let you compare the promotion against other time periods. The purchase funnel shows how many visits turn into purchases and where shoppers drop off. Learn more about tracking your site performance with Squarespace analytics.

See how often your discount was redeemed

In the Discounts panel, check how many people redeemed each discount. For example, if you handed out a promo code at an event, you can see how many attendees used it afterward.

Match your goal to the right tools

Use these questions to shape your promotion plan.

Which items do you want to discount?

• Sale pricing highlights select items.
• Discounts suit targeted promotions, and can apply to specific categories or to orders over a set amount.

How long will this sale run for?

• To clear back stock or liven up a slow season, leave sale pricing in place until the items sell out.
• To create a temporary boost, announce a time limit on the discount so shoppers act sooner.

Which customers are you targeting?

• Clearly marked sale pricing can sway casual visitors with significant savings.
• Sending a promo code to a social channel or mailing list rewards followers and shows you which channel drove the sales.

Which marketing channels will you use?

• Share discounted items on social media to reach followers and their friends.
• Connect a Mailchimp audience to stay in touch with past customers.

What’s your most important goal?

Whether you want to clear back stock, attract new clients, or boost overall sales, you can combine features in different ways to get there. Learn more about increasing your store's sales.