Setting up discounts and promotions

A discount is the fastest way to change behavior at a machine, and the fastest way to give away margin you did not need to. Both are true.

Setting a discount

1. Open the discount or promotion settings for the machine or product.
2. Choose what the discount applies to — a single product, a category, or everything.
3. Set the amount, as either a percentage or a fixed reduction.
4. Set a start and end date. Always set an end date; open-ended discounts are how a promotion becomes a permanent price cut nobody decided on.
5. Save, then buy the item yourself and confirm the discounted price is what is actually charged.

Promotions worth running

• Clearing short-dated stock. This is the honest use of a discount — you are choosing some money over none.
• Launching a new product. Two weeks at a lower price gets it tried; after that it either sells or it does not, and you have learned something.
• Filling a dead time of day, if the platform lets you schedule by hour. A discount at 3pm in an office can pull forward demand that was going to leave the building.
• Venue-specific goodwill. A standing discount for staff at the host site costs little and buys you a venue contact who likes having the machine there.

Promotions that quietly cost you

• Permanent discounts on your best sellers. You are paying people to buy what they were buying anyway.
• Discounts deep enough to make customers wait for the next one.
• Multiple overlapping promotions on the same machine, which are impossible to attribute and usually stack in ways nobody intended.
• Discounts on items that are out of stock half the week, which trains customers that the offer is not real.

Measure it properly

Before you start, write down what the item sold in the previous two weeks. Afterwards, compare — and compare total margin, not units. Selling forty percent more of something at a thirty percent discount can leave you worse off, and it feels like success while it is happening.