The Boom-Bust Cycle of Discount Promotions

While discounts can boost short-term revenue, they often do more harm than good.

By Scott Bell

Every time you run a discount promotion of any kind, you send the message to your customers that your price points are movable; that while your products may not be cheap now, they will be eventually.

Achieving a 1 percent increase in retention can give you a 5 percent increase in sales. If your sales are lagging, it’s more than likely that some of your distributors aren’t sufficiently motivated to tell the world about your products.

Need a fast way to perk up your direct selling organization’s sluggish sales numbers? The easy answer is to run a promotion. But is this the right answer?

It’s easy to say yes when your buy-one-get-one event causes a huge spike in the sales numbers for your best-known product line. After all, nobody wants to argue with cold, hard cash.