to Advertise Your Business
Top 25Places
CouponsUsing

Coupons are vital to your
business.
Yes, coupons can advertise your
business, but they can also provide
you with a wide amount of
information about your customers.

It’s important to use coupons
to advertise your business.
Not only are you providing a value to
your customers, you’re finding out
what campaigns they respond to, and
possibly why.

So, how do you get started
with coupons?
Let’s take a look at 25 places to
advertise. Remember, this isn’t an
exhaustive list, but it is a great
starting point. Do these options first,
and you may not need to look any
further.

OfflineLet’s start offline. As a local small business, it’s a good idea to reach
out to your customers offline first. Oftentimes, customers who frequent
local businesses are persuaded by the following methods:

1)Local Newspaper
Tom Egelhoff offers insightful information on how to place a small town
newspaper ad. Even if you live in a big city, you should probably stick
with smaller publications that cater to your core demographic.

2)Valpak
Valpak is a direct marketing service that sends coupons and ads
through the postal service. Prices vary depending on the scope of the
campaign, but a minimum of 10,000 houses is required. Expect to pay
between $150 to $400 per campaign.

3)Flyers
Whether the flyer is only a collection of coupons, or if you’re sharing
information about your business and adding a coupon as an incentive
at the bottom, flyers are effective at evangelism.

4)By Seth Price. A recent study from the National Association of Realtors
revealed that 92% of buyers use the internet to house hunt. This
strongly indicates a need for all real estate business to have an
established online presence.
Pizza Boxes

5)Postcard Marketing
Although the slant of this article was on real estate, you can easily
parlay any type of coupon into postcard marketing. The benefit of
using postcards is that customers don’t need to open it–all
information is readily available.

6)Community
Bulletin Boards
Many community centers, coffee shops, book shops, and grocery
stores have community bulletin boards. Be on the lookout for any in
your area. If you see one, pin up your flyer (with attached coupons).

7) Niche magazines
Can you business gain exposure by placing a coupon in the
advertisement section of a magazine in your niche? If so, don’t
hesitate to do so. Although you may be a local business, you may be
able to sell remotely.

8)Red Plum
Red Plum is a coupon service that’s available online, in your mailbox,
in the newspaper, or online. You may recognize it as a coupon circular.
It often has brands like Suave, Hawaiian Tropic and Degree.

9)SmartSource
Very similar to Red Plum, Smartsource is also a coupon service. You
can advertise with both, but Red Plum and Smartsource are fiercely
competitive and may not allow you to place coupons in both
simultaneously.

OnlineLocal businesses can still advertise online. In fact, most consumers will
attempt to find your business online, so it’s best to provide them with at
least one of these options:

10)coupons.com
This billion dollar startup is highly influential in the marketplace. If you
want to reach frugal-minded consumers, you must have a local
presence on coupons.com.

11)Email Newsletter
Creating a newsletter is a must for small businesses. It keeps you
relevant. When sending out your newsletter, why not include a coupon?
It a wonderful incentive for your core customer-base.

12)Groupon
We’ve created a thorough guide to Groupon. Check the page out to
find out how to use Groupon to advertise your business.

13)Living Social
Living Social is a deal of the day site and is very similar to Groupon.
You’ll find more about LivingSocial in the above article on Group.

14)Amazon Local
Rounding off the list of daily deal sites is Amazon Local.

15)Yelp for Business
Use Yelp Deals to create coupon advertisements on Yelp. You offer a
discount, typically around 50% off. Yelp takes 30% off of the
purchase price, and you get the rest. It’s similar to the Groupon
model, except Yelp leaves you with a greater profit.

16)Facebook
With Facebook, you can increase your likes while providing a coupon.
There’s several apps that can help you create a coupon on Facebook.
Try apps such as Woobox or AgoraPulse Facebook Coupon App.

17)Twitter
Use Twitter to make quick posts, like flash coupons, for your products
or services. If you have an active customer base who’s on social
media, they will jump at the chance to buy from you at a discounted
rate.

18)RetailMeNot
RetailMeNot is a huge digital coupon marketplace. You’re very likely to
see the big name companies here, sharing with lesser knowns. A fun
thing about RetailMeNot is that users can directly add coupon codes
to the site.

19)SmartReceipt
If you frequently print out receipts for your customers, why not
leverage the wasted space on the receipts to advertise a deal? Use
the blank space to provide a valuable coupon for the customer.

20)Catalina Marketing
Similar to SmartReceipt, Catalina ads print up at the point of sale. The
difference is that Catalina ads are printed from a separate machine
that the POS register.

21) CouponCabin
CouponCabin is similar to RetailMeNot. It allows users to hunt for
promotional codes, and also search by sales.

22)On your website/
lightbox
Use your own website to promote your coupons. Customers check out
your website for many different reasons. Add a discount with an opt-in
lightbox. There’s different ways to do this, but check out Kyla’s tutorial
on OptinMonster.

On other websitesYou may have noticed advertisements on the borders of your favorite
websites. You can also advertise your coupons on other websites. Most
websites that offer advertising space provide a link to a price page. It’s a
good idea to find websites that cater to your key demographic.

23)Referrals
Use a referral system to advertise your business. You can provide
referrals with a personal discount as an incentive to refer your
business. Additionally, you can assign those referrals a special
discount code to give to their sphere of influence.

24)Mobile Coupons
Ashley Eckel has a very useful article about how to create a successful
mobile coupon campaign. It’s important to diversify your coupon
advertising. Study this article to find out how to create the highest
engagement.

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