Worried About Coupon and Discount Affiliate Sites Cannibalizing Sales? Here’s Why You Shouldn’t Be…

In the affiliate world, coupon and discount sites are a touchy subject and we kind of get why.

One of the most common objections we come across with new clients unfamiliar with or new to the affiliate space is that they’re concerned coupon and discount publications simply squeeze margins for little to no gain. For this reason, they don’t want to include them in their affiliate strategy.

The fear is valid. After all, in a channel that’s about customer acquisition, if a customer is already in the checkout area, then searches Google for a coupon as a plug and play, that quite clearly would defeat the purpose of having the coupon site in the first place. The effect would be cannibalization of the company’s sales. 

That customer may have been one you felt confident you had already, and for no reason, you just lost a chunk of your revenue in a matter of minutes.

While we certainly agree this is one of the dangers and frustrations of these sites – especially if your customer base is relatively tech savvy – there’s a pretty good explanation for keeping coupon and discount sites running.

Essentially, they’re effective when it comes to luring in new customers. And in the end, in many cases, they become profitable. This is especially true when you give them time to reach top-of-funnel consumers.

If a certain discount publication is a well known place where people go to start their shopping experience, you’ll make up what you could “lose” in margins with new customers.

If that publication is one where people find new products and services for the first time, then that publisher will likely attract new customers that would have probably never found you otherwise. Or worse yet, those customers might have bought a competitor’s product.

Without disclosing the name of the company, here’s a bit of information on a major discount site and the success it has brought many merchants utilizing its platform.

They claim, “Stop losing orders to consumer doubt. When your customers use [our site] to search for savings without leaving your site, cart abandonment decreases by 40% on average. That’s true even when no coupons are found.”

There’s also the loyalty aspect of companies partnering with sites like these. This same website found in the data that orders from stores participating in their rewards program outpaced orders from non-participants by 60%.

They also added, “Stay top-of-mind with our paid placement program. You create custom offers and we serve them to consumers at the ideal moment. To date, the program has yielded an impressive 7:1 ROAS for partners.”

These discount sites have insights into purchase intent and shopping habits, generating positive results for shoppers and for companies looking to find those shoppers.

At Advertise Purple, every day we come across clients who benefit from coupon and discount sites. Under no circumstances would we lead you astray. If our team believes a coupon or discount placement works for you, you’re likely to see ROI increase. If not, we will rework your strategy. We’re always optimizing and tinkering with client programs. 

So, hopefully this quelled your fear of these types of sites. Good luck out there!