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Hello!

Welcome to the 9th edition of Always Be Convenient, your guide to navigating today’s digital world as a brand that depends on bricks-and-mortar retail.

Yesterday was one of my favorite days of the year: National Coffee Day ☕📅

Even though it was 84°F here in Des Moines, IA, I still had a few cups in the morning and then stopped by a local convenience store for a free cup late in the afternoon. But more on that in a moment.

Today is the last day of calendar Q3, which means Q4 and the end of the year is nearly here. Throw in the NACS Show, a few other events, then Thanksgiving and Christmas and 2024 is done.

If you’re planning ahead you’re already into 2025. If not, there’s never a better time to start than now. 😉

As I do my own planning for the weeks and months ahead, I’d love for you take this one-question survey to help me shape the future of this newsletter. Your feedback is critical to making this a success.

Conveniently,
Mike

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Now I’ve gone ahead and spoiled it for you. Is there anything more I need to say?

In honor of yesterday’s coffee holiday, I want to talk about price promotions in the digital age.

While it might not be uncommon for someone to suggest that coffee demand is shrinking, forecasts from the International Coffee Organization actually show North America rebounding this year after dealing with large variability due to longstanding impacts of COVID-19.

Regardless of whether you drink coffee, or if your stakeholders listen to data over opinion, let’s talk about how to use opportunities like this to drive digital connections with your customers.

One of the hardest things to do in this noisy digital world is to get consumers to pay attention to what you have to say.

Your customers are pinged hundreds of times per day by their devices. It’s texts from friends and loved ones, alerts from their favorite games, or emails about work.

What you’re looking for, as a retail marketer, is to raise your status in the attention sphere of the consumer. If you don’t have something worthwhile to say, you’re likely to be ignored – simply because the sheer volume of annoyances is overwhelming.

Now enters National Coffee Day. You don’t have to believe in these holidays (or ‘small-idays’ as my former colleague Katie Petru likes to call them), but you should absolutely be thinking about how to leverage them to grow your business.

I have a lot of apps on my phone. Something like 579 to be specific. And a lot of retailers were alerting me to National Coffee Day yesterday.

What I hope you notice from this subset of messages is how they marketed the day.

Many retailers ran promotions in conjunction with the holiday, giving them an opportunity to tie their product to a day coffee fans would be happy to celebrate.

As you take a closer look, however, you may also notice the different approaches.

• One brand gave the customer nothing but a marketing message.

• Others offered a special price on a cup of coffee for the day.

• Another brand promised a free cup, as long as you bought it with something else at a certain time of the day.

The messages I liked the most – both as a marketer and as a consumer – were the ones where I could try a cup for free.

Every day you have a chance to sell a cup of coffee. Those who know about your offering and like it are probably buying it. But what about those who aren’t?

If you’re going to give a consumer a reason to take a chance, why would you put a barrier in their way?

I know many might be opposed to giving a cup away. They are worried about margin loss and subsidization of existing behavior.

But at the same time, you have an opportunity to reward a customer and show them how much you appreciate them. Or you could bring in a new customer who has nothing to lose with a free cup.

What’s the worst that could happen? That you drive a lot of trial for a category that plays an important role in the habitual nature of convenience-seeking consumers?

Opportunities like this are your chance to help set up the future of your business and ensure its long-term success. And the relevance to the consumer is built right in.

Now, don’t take this and think I’m all about bleeding the company dry. The reason I’m passionate about this approach is that I’ve seen it work.

Contrary to what you might think, the company will not go bankrupt over a promotion like this. Endless shrimp, of course, is another story.

When I ran promotions like this during my tenure in retail, we consistently saw customers adding other items to the basket during free item promotions. Around two-thirds of redemptions had two items or more.

You also have great mechanisms like loyalty programs, which can enable some controls to help protect yourself. I’d simply challenge you to gauge how much protection is necessary, and whether the layers you’re adding are keeping things convenient for the customer or not.

Investing in your customers, even with a free cup of coffee, does more than you might imagine. And most are willing to thank you in return with more business.

Have you had success capitalizing on free promotions with your customers? Or are you skeptical something like this would work? It’d be great to hear from you in either case. Hit reply and tell me what you think.