Increase Membership & Event Sales with Promotional Codes
Get creative in your marketing style by using promotional codes! Membee’s promotional code features brings powerful discounting mechanism with performance tracking included that will allow you to build, publicize, and refine a new powerful sales initiatives!
There are endless possibilities in using promotional codes in Membee. Whether its to increase your membership sales or event sales, it’s limitless! You can provide a direct promotional code or a conditional promotional code to your members by combining new membership sales, existing membership renewals, and/or event registration into a promo code to further encourage future sales.
Why Use Promo Codes
The goal is to increase your membership and event sales by incentivizing your purchasers. There are three major objectives for creating promotional codes:
- Sell more! Incentivize your purchasers to buy additional items that they wouldn’t have purchased originally
- Conversion! Make the next step to motivate non-members to become members while experiencing member benefits at a discounted cost
- Add membership benefits! Being a premium member just better – offer various discounts for premium members to increase your sales from existing members
Promo Codes in Action
We can all agree that $30 for an item always looks more enticing than $50! It’s simple for your users to apply a promo code.
Let’s use Alex Jones, a member of the Bee Hive Association, as an example. Alex received an e-newsletter about a friends-and-family 25% discount for any new members to join the Bee Hive Association until the end of April. The e-newsletter provided the code “25OFFNEW” that could be applied during checkout.
Marie, a non-member and a friend of Alex, has been interested in joining the Association. Alex proceeds to share the promo code with Marie and she decides to take advantage of the 25% off promotion. When Marie selects the item “Bronze Membership” and inputs the promo code, the discount was applied to her item making it $45 instead of the original price of $60, as seen below.
Get Creative and Set It Up
The possibilities are infinite! You can create promo codes for your events, your renewals, new member sign-ups, or all of it combined – whichever might incentivize your purchasers the most. You can tell Membee what specific items offer the discount(s) and you set the conditions for your promotional codes.
You can set the following:
- A direct or conditional promotional code
- Discount can be used for
- New membership purchases
- Existing member renewals
- Event registrations
- Or a combination of the above
- Dollar or percentage based discounts
- Set a date range for when the discount begins and expires
- Set the maximum number of uses for the code
- Create a volume discount that requires a minimum purchase to apply the discount
Membee then generates a “discount” or a “promo code” that can be shared with your members or non-members and can be applied to a purchase at checkout.
Direct vs Conditional Promo Codes
To help you better understand the difference between direct and conditional promotional codes, take a look at the comparison table below:
| Direct Promotional Codes | Conditional Promotional Codes |
| Simple and Effective | Complex but Powerful |
| Discount is applicable to a single specified event or membership item | Discount can be applicable to multiple number of items |
| General promo code can be redeemed by anyone and everyone who has the code | Uniquely generated when a purchaser purchases an eligible item to receive the code |
| Commonly shared via an e-newsletter or email | Exclusive discount that is only available to purchasers |
| Eg. “Register for this event by a specific date and get $50 off” | Eg. “Renew your membership and get a $100 discount for a specific upcoming event” |
Looking for more examples? We’ve included a list of common examples further into this buzz post that are utilized by our diverse market of users and organizations who are active in Membee.
Performance Tracking
A great benefit to using promo codes in Membee is the ability to track the performance of your promo codes. Membee provides the total number of items sold where a promo code could have been applied vs the total number of items sold where the promo code was redeemed. This allows you to see how well the promo code is doing and if purchasers are fully utilizing and taking advantage of the promo code.
Common Marketing Examples of Promotional Codes
We’ve formed a list of common examples used by many client organizations across different types of industries. The great thing about using promotional codes as a marketing strategy is that it can be tailored to best fit your organization’s membership benefits. Think about how the following examples can be used for your organization.
Direct Promotional Codes
These codes are simple and applied directly to specific items. These can be redeemed by anyone and everyone who possesses the code.
“Bring a Friend” Referral Code
This simple discount code can be applied to the sale of a new membership and event sale. It can be sent to existing members who can share it with a non-member, encouraging them to sign up or register for an event, much like the example with Alex and Marie at the beginning of this buzz post.
“Buy 2 and Get a 15% Discount”
This is a common situation, applied to event purchases. This discount would generate registrations that you would not have originally had without the discount. Depending on your membership structure, the same concept could apply to new memberships as well.
“Register for This Event by a Specific Date and Get $50 Off”
Getting event registrations earlier can help your event build greater momentum that will yield even more registrations! This is an effective approach if the event is new and has yet to earn its “street cred”.
“Get a Free Membership”
Wait a minute! That doesn’t sound right, isn’t that going in the wrong direction? Well… give it a try! Create a promotion that generates a 100% discount on membership but only share the code with your Board members and your most staunch supporters. Your board members and your staunchest supporters interact daily with similar, like-minded people and organizations. The cost of acquiring a new client exceeds the revenues generated in the first year of the relationship. Your “cost of acquisition” here is nearly zero and you’re acquiring new members who are similar to the ones you already have! Take this opportunity to build incredible relationships with these members redeeming the “free membership”.
“Join in December and get 25% Off Your First Year”
Run a “limited time offer” promotion in a time of year where your new member intake is historically slow. Using the beginning and expiry dates in your promotion, the discount will automatically expire so you can share it with potential members using social media.
“Renew by a Specific Date and Get $20 Discount”
A historic “accounts receivable” approach to membership renewal could have an organization trying to apply financial penalties for late renewal. Some would say that such penalties pile even more stress on the relationship with a less than motivated member. By creating a promotion that is valid only when members renew allows you to create a positive experience for the member when renewal comes around.
Conditional Promotion Examples
Conditional promotions require a purchase of an eligible item in order to receive the promo code for a discount that can be applied to the purchase of another item.
“Buy an Event and Get a Free Membership”
Already have non-members purchasing event tickets? Make the next step by providing a discount where the registration of a specific event by a non-member will trigger the delivery of a “100% discount” for the purchase of a free membership. These free members will get to experience the glory of being a member of your organization!
“Buy an Event – Get a Free Membership AND a 10% Discount on a Book”
Now this is the of conditional promotions – the ability to have multiple discounts upon the purchase of an eligible conditional item. By purchasing an event item (or any item you set), you get the benefit of having two other discounts. Promotions like these can increase your sales and highly increase member participation.
“Buy a Membership and Get 25% Off a Specific Event”
This conditional promotion motivates a potential new member to join and immediately gain access to an event discount, just like your long-term members. Because the promotion is conditional, the new member gains access to the discount only after they have acquired their membership.
“Buy a Membership and Get a 10% Discount Off a Series of Events”
A conditional promotion can be used to extend a discount for an entire series of events (a set of events grouped together into a specific Event Category). For example, after the purchase of a membership, your new member would receive a discount code that reduces their registration in any event in your “Education” group of events.
“Pay Your Membership Renewal and Get a $100 Discount for a Specific Upcoming Event”
Increase your member retention rate by providing an extra incentive for members to renew. Receiving a high benefit for renewing might be just enough to ensure that your members are renewing.
“Pay Your Platinum Membership Renewal and Get a 100% Discount for an Upcoming Series of Events”
Premium level memberships might be your most valuable members. This promotion better ensures that a premium member is likely to renew their membership. Keep in mind that often having the option to attend an event or a series of events for free is what is valued by the member whether they redeem the discount or not.
“Pay Your Membership Renewal by a Certain Date and Get a Discount for an Event if Your Register by a Specific Expiry Date”
This promotional code aids renewal by accelerating renewal while motivating members to renew in order to gain access to the event discount by a specific date. Your event wins through increased and accelerated registration thanks to the expiry date set on the discount!
Questions? Want to Share Your Story?
To learn more about Membee’s promotional codes feature, jump to our guide by clicking here (Membee login required).
If you have any questions regarding Membee or if you would like to share your story with Membee for a chance to be featured in a blog, please contact Membee support staff at support@membee.com