Great coupon statistics to help formulate your marketing strategy

7 min readJul 3, 2019

Coupon is a buzzword in today’s eCommerce scenario. It provides multiple benefits to consumers as well as retailers. They increase leads, sales and conversion rate and these benefits, drive retailers to devise effective coupon marketing strategy to develop customer loyalty for their brands. For consumers, coupons not only offer great savings but help them reaching a final decision in their purchasing journey. 65% consumers admit that coupons help them finalize their decisions if they are undecided.

Businesses therefore need to follow coupon statistics in order to remain relevant with ground realities and also to evolve their coupon marketing campaign accordingly having focused on right offer, right time and choosing right channel. Let’s check out some of the most vital coupon statistics which every retail business need to follow:

General Statistics:

According to latest research, 90% of consumers use coupons.
According to NCH year-end 2018 coupon facts, 256.5 billion coupons were distributed.
NCH coupon fact sheet further reveals that digital paperless coupons shared only 1.5% of total coupons distributed whereas, 94% was shared by FSI free standing insert.
The 74.7% coupons were shared by Non-food segment of industry while 25.3% was for food category business.
37% of the consumers say they purchase more items than normal.
25% consumers spend more overall due to coupons.
Total 1.715 billion coupons were redeemed in 2018(both printed and digital) with a face value of $ 2.7 billion.
It is expected that, 31 billion e-coupons will be redeemed in 2019.This is an impressive growth, compared to 16 billion in 2014.
By 2019, there will be 1.05 billion mobile coupon users, higher by 490 million from 2014.
Each month, coupon apps are used by more than 25% of American consumers.
According to Juniper Research, there will be a 94% increase in digital coupon redemption by 2022.
The chatbot coupon volume will rise from 25 million to 1.1 billion in next five years.
The global mobile coupon market is expected to grow by more than 56.5% CAGR by 2025.
The % of American companies using Mobile coupons for marketing was 48% in 2017 against 36.5% in 2014.
Nearly 61% consumers are influenced by coupons or deals while making purchases.
46% of the consumers who redeem digital coupons have not purchased the product previously, showing how effectively coupons increase consumer’s desire to purchase a product.

Consumer’s usage and preferences for Coupons:

Consumers saved 3.1 billion dollars in 2017 due to use of coupons.
82% consumers prefer digital coupons over printed options because of convenience factor.
The digital coupon redemption rate is 77% higher than printed coupons.
According to Inmar’s 2019 shopping behavior study, 80% of the consumers reported that their purchasing behavior have been changes in some way by Coupons.
37% of the consumers reported that they bought sooner, due to coupons, than they would otherwise have shopped.
35% purchased a particular brand due to coupon, which they would not buy otherwise.
35% admitted, they purchased more, than they had planned, thanks to coupons.
An NCH study shows that more than 60% of the consumers are influenced by coupons for grocery items.
According to 68% consumers, coupons increase brand awareness.
32% of the consumers look for on-line coupons on a weekly basis.
92% of the Americans share the exclusive offer with friends and family.
57% consumers want real time promotions.
93% of Millennials reported that they use mobile devices to compare deals both on-line as well as in-store.
According to a Psychology today study, coupon using habitual customers prefers to buy products through coupon even if it results in spending more money. Citing an example the study reported that shoppers preferred to buy a 6-pack yogurt in $ 4.29 after applying a 50 cent coupon, than paying $3.99 for the same pack at the same store in a different week.

Coupons have a positive relation with customer’s Loyalty:

According to Marketing Metrics, there is at least a 60% chance that a customer who has purchased once from a company, will repurchase from it.
The survey of American consumer, as reported by Business Wire, reveals that more than half of the people surveyed reported they will switch to a new brand if it offers them coupon.
According to Expedia affiliate Network, Discount and coupons rank 1st in driving customer’s loyalty because 61% consumers report to use them.
According to Edelman, customers who support your brand continuously and over time will, spend 67% more than new customers.
The 68% percent of consumers thinks that coupons generate brand loyalty.
The 77% consumers mentioned surprise points and special birthday messaging as a factor in boosting brand loyalty.
American hold 3.8 billion loyalty programs memberships.
55% of consumers subscribe to mobile messaging because of loyalty reward points.

Retailer’s marketing strategies and Coupons:

Before going for some vital statistics let us see how coupon strategy is being used by today’s intelligent retailers.

How retailers are using coupons:

Research has shown that planned discounts and couponing generate more revenue for retail businesses than everyday low pricing.
Retailers are also using it for better inventory management and forecasting profitability.
The retailers are using customized coupon books for specific customers based on their previous purchase records.
They held coupon promotion to not only boost traffic and conversion but to get their brand noticed.
Retailers use coupons for impulse buying by consumers.

Statistics that Retail Businesses need to follow:

A free-standing insert is the top most way to send coupons. I.e. in newspaper or mail box.93% of coupon distribution was made through this channel.
According to NCH year-end 2018, Coupon fact sheet, about top 3 coupon media channels according to average redemption rate are: 1st- In/On pack with 15.25%., 2nd-Direct mail with 7.93% and 3rd-Digital with 6.92%.
The CPG (Consumer packaged goods) marketers drove 27% increase in overall digital distribution, which contributed to an additional 47% paperless coupon redemption.
55% of the consumers aged 18–34 years said they download coupons from coupon sites, while for consumers in age group of 35 to 54, this trend is 38%.Above 54 years only 21% consumers download coupons from coupon sites.
Forrester consulting research on finding digital coupons reveal that 57% consumers prefer promotion via email from a retailer. The next two preferences are search engines browsing on smartphone (55%) and getting link to coupon on cell phone 39%.
Emails containing coupons, offer a 48% increase in revenue per email.
52% of American says they will report their purchasing history to a retailer if they are offered a coupon.
68% of Americans say exclusive offers are more important than coupons that are available for everyone.
According to a Valassis study finding, 86% of consumers make purchases based on in-store discounts, such as through circulars and mobile notification.

Creating Content Calendar:

Content calendar is a great tool in your digital marketing using a comprehensive schedule of all your content related activities throughout the year. It brings not only your own team on one page about the entire content marketing strategy but also informs every one about what is going to be published. It helps your team to plan content around all important upcoming events, so that milestones may be set in advance. This helps you to set timelines and meet them effectively by sensing gaps at the right time and filling those effectively because you have enough time at your disposable for brain storming and writing down content that is required.

Let’s check out steps to create content calendar effectively:

Step1-Repurpose/remix your existing content:

Take stock of your existing content and try to make it more purposeful by remixing intelligently creating more with less. Don’t try the option of creating all from the scratch because, you have your own repository of existing resources and data from which you can create wonderful and meaningful fresh content. Here are some tips to utilize the existing content for even more impressive yet fresh material:

Use old blog posts by updating it through latest figures/trends/information.
Create new stories and info-graphics using your own data and research.
Develop new videos and audios using the skills of your content marketing team, from the in-house resources and archives of posts/blogs.
Use content atomization technique: This technique consists of breaking one big piece of content and making many small pieces of meaningful content out of it.

Step2-Develop content shows:

You have to think and act like TV networks who target assorted audience and develop shows for them. These can be one-time shows, consistent shows with same format (bi-monthly, preferably) and regular round the year programs with different themes. In case you already possess shows in your content archive, all you need to do is to present them differently with some official titles. Otherwise you can create your own fresh shows.

Step3-Develop plans and publish content:

Planning requires lots of periodic formal meeting of all team members deliberating analytics and statistics of previous periods. Through these meetings you can finalize your content and set realistic timelines for publishing it.

You can then create a good functional and easy to refer monthly scheduled content calendar broken into four quarters of a year, featuring all your content presentations throughout the year.

Wrap Up:

What started by Coca Cola in 1890’s as coupon offer to get one free bottle, is now a global phenomenon, spiraled by mammoth growth in digitization. This great coupon extravaganza has created new opportunities for retailers to increase engagement of targeted customers and give boost to their sales volumes. The vital statistics presented above and others like these may provide a better guide for formulating your action plans for marketing.

Couponing is here to stay as most businesses and brands are using it extensively as a marketing tool for attracting new customers and rewarding loyalty. Statistics are crucial for each player to keep fingers on pulse of market trends.