Mobile Coupons & How They Are Being Redeemed

One of the main draws of coupons has always been that retailers can measure the success of a particular campaign by tabulating how many coupons they receive back out of the total number distributed. Several different coupon campaigns can go on at once to indicate which promotional strategy is driving the most engagement. As you know, these telling statistics are golden. The mobile coupon works much the same way — except that, instead of paper bar codes, customers use online shop codes or digital scan codes. Yet, apart from measurability, what other benefits can digitally redeemed coupons deliver to retailers and brands?

Cost!

The most immediate benefit is cost for two main reasons:

Firstly, mobile coupons cost a fraction of their paper cousins to distribute and redeem. But the cost benefits do not stop there – distribution of coupons takes on a new mindset.
Secondly, paper coupons are normally distributed on a scatter-gun approach. Marketers print around 100 times more than they expect to redeem and send them out to all and sundry.

Redemption Rate!

The mobile coupon has clear benefits for retailers and brands alike, but what about the consumer? Are they embracing mobile coupons?

With coupons via text, our experience is that they are normally requested by consumers in the first place, in response to an ad in traditional media or within the mobile environment. Once requested, redemption is between 20 percent and 40 percent, and has actually been as high as 100 percent in a few instances. This means that the marketer dramatically reduces the number of coupons in the first place. According to Borrell Associates, mobile coupons receive 10 times’ the redemption rate of their traditional paper counterparts!

Experience with the likes of retailers Comet (electrical retail), Aurora (fashion) and Blockbuster (movie rentals) that employ mobile coupons redeemed via Chip & PIN terminals in Britain (credit card terminals in U.S. terminology) have proved that consumers love mobile coupon technology, with redemption being many times higher than the old paper-based variant. Metrics consistently show that consumers find mobile coupons to be useful and that consumers often visit retailers and become more inclined to purchase after receiving a “ShopAlert” on their mobile devices.

Ease of Use!

Apart from the clear cost advantages, mobile coupons have more important benefits for marketers. Customers like using them over paper. Frequently, consumers indicate that, while they have never used paper coupons, “using a mobile coupon is cool.” So, perhaps mobile coupons will expand the market, as well as cater to an existing need.