In case you haven’t visited your Discounts Section in your Shopify backend lately, Shopify quietly released a new kind of Discount Code:
Shopify Buy X Get Y Discounts
Until now, you’ve had to use an app to give customers this kind of deal.
Customers can now enter a coupon code during the checkout process to take advantage of the deal you have to offer.
With Shopify’s Buy X, Get Y discount code, you have two options as the seller:
- Offer your customer a percentage off the deal item(s)
- The deal item(s) is FREE
? There is no fixed price discount option.
Here is a screenshot in the admin view:
You must specify the quantity the customer needs to purchase as well as the specific products or collections.
You then need to specify the quantity as well as the products or collections the customer will receive at a discount or for free.
From the customer’s perspective, they need to add the necessary items and quantities to their cart before they can enter the coupon code and the discount takes effect.
That means they need to add the entire combination of items: what they need to buy at full price and then what they will receive at a discount or for free.
So if the deal is buy 3 items from Collection A and get a 4th item from Collection A for free, they need to add 4 items from Collection A and then apply the coupon code.
If they do not have the correct items in their cart, they will receive an error message that looks like this:
“Your cart does not meet the requirements for the XYZ discount code”
This is a bit problematic if you have any complicated offers since it doesn’t tell the customer what they are missing so my suggestion is to keep things simple.
Here are some potential ideas for this new discount code:
- Buy 2 items from a Collection A and get a third item from Collection B for free
- Buy any item in the store and get the second item for 50% (or any other discount)
- Buy 3 of the same item and get the 4th free
Does the Shopify Buy X Get Y Discount Replace my Paid Upsell & BOGO Apps?
I think this new discount code a good option for anyone who has a new store and wants to get their feet wet with a BOGO offer WITHOUT having to purchase an app.
However, I think that dedicated Upsell Apps like the one from Bold Commerce and the Ultimate Special Offers app by Supple Apps are still much more powerful and offer a better (different) customer experience.
So the answer to that question is no and for a very simple reason: Shopify’s discount requires that the customer knows the coupon code and enters in the correct combination of items.
At the end of the day, this is simply another coupon code you can offer to your customers.
I think it’s a good option if you want to run a flash sale on certain items or offer a secret deal to VIP members. That’s what I would do at least.
With the Bold Upsell app for example, the customer experience is a little different.
- The customer adds an item to their cart
- The app will present the customer with the upsell offer (either immediately or during the checkout process)
- The discount will automatically apply
So hopefully that brings you up to speed on Shopify’s new coupon code!