Running a sale is a great way to motivate customers to make their first purchase. And even if you already have a loyal base of customers, sales can help you earn more of them, increase the average lifetime value of existing customers, or minimize losses by offloading less-than-popular SKUs.
The question is, how do you run a sale using WooCommerce?
WooCommerce enables you to run multiple types of online sales by default. You can provide discounts via coupons for individual orders, put specific products or entire categories on sale, run flash promotions, and more. Understanding how each type of sale works and how to implement it with WooCommerce will help you grow your business more effectively.
In this guide, we’ll start by discussing the benefits of offering sales. Then we’ll show you how to run a sale in WooCommerce using eight different approaches. We’ll even provide some tips and advice along the way. Let’s go!
Why it’s smart to run sales in WooCommerce
Before we show you how to run a sale in WooCommerce, let’s go over the advantages of doing so.
Convert more sales
Whether it’s a first-time shopper or a long-time customer, if someone sees a great deal, they’re more likely to act.
First, 46 percent of online shoppers say that a discounted price is the primary reason for a recent purchase. So giving people a chance to take advantage of a great deal will definitely encourage visitors to convert to customers.
In fact, the majority of consumers seek out coupons, and are twice as likely to buy products if they’re at least 20 percent off. So even moderate discounts can help move products much faster.
Increase average customer lifetime value
Finding customers isn’t easy. And if you provide a great product and strong service, first-time customers often turn into repeat buyers and eventually brand enthusiasts. Long-time WooCommerce store owners know just how valuable this can be.
To make the costs of acquiring customers worth the investment, you need to maximize the lifetime value of every customer you have.
Some of this is the great service and quality products mentioned before, but you can also take a much more proactive approach. Presenting sales offers to previous customers — for products or product categories they’ve expressed interest in — can serve as a thank you for their loyalty and increase their overall spend with your online store.
Reduce extra inventory with minimal waste
Every store that has winning products also has SKUs that don’t meet expectations. Holding these in your warehouse costs you storage fees and holds up cash flow.
But by running deep sales for products you need to get rid of anyways, you can claw back some of your losses and free up cash for investment into new SKUs or marketing efforts.
Eight effective ways to run a sale in WooCommerce
Now, we’re going to show you how to run a sale in WooCommerce. We’ll go over eight different ways to do this, and talk about the pros and cons of each approach. This way, you can more easily decide which method(s) you want to use.
1. Product discounts
Product discounts are the most straightforward type of sale you can create with WooCommerce. You can set a Regular price ($) as well as a Sale price ($) for each item.
To do this, go to Products → All Products and click on the item you’d like to offer at a discount. Scroll down to the Product data section.
If you enter any value into the WooCommerce Sale price ($) field, that will be the price visitors see on the front end of the store. This field overrides the Regular price ($) value. If you’re not hosting a sale, leave that field empty so you don’t discount products by mistake.
As you can see, it isn’t too complicated to add sale prices in WooCommerce isn’t hard. But it can be time-consuming if you’re running a big promotion with large numbers of discounted products. That’s because you’ll need to set a sale price for each product, and then update all of them again once the campaign ends.
Fortunately, WooCommerce offers a way to edit product prices in bulk, which can be incredibly useful when it comes to a large sale. To do this, go to Products → All Products tab.
Select all the items you want to edit by checking the boxes on the left side of the screen next to their names. Now open the Bulk actions menu, click on Edit, then Apply.
This will open a “quick” editor that enables you to make changes to the products in bulk. Look for the section that says Product data and click on the Sale menu.
This menu includes multiple options for setting discount prices for each product. You can choose to increase or decrease WooCommerce sale prices here.
If you choose the third option, which is Set to regular price decreased by (fixed amount or %) you can set percentage-based discounts for all the products you’re editing. This example illustrates setting a five percent discount:
For percentage discounts, be sure to enter the number followed by the percent symbol. When you’re done, click on the Update button.
This will close the quick editor and return you to the All products screen. If you check the Price column for the selected products, you’ll see that their prices are now discounted by five percent.
Just remember to update the product prices again once the sale is over!
2. Flash sales
A flash sale is a discount campaign with a set timeline. Typically, flash sales only last for a few hours or days. The idea behind this type of campaign is to leverage the fear of missing out (FOMO) and encourage visitors to make snap decisions on purchases.
Research has shown that flash sales tend to increase both the number of visitors and their overall spending. Stores often run flash sales with especially deep discounts (more than you’d see during regular sales) for specific products, and may sometimes let sales last until stock runs out.
By default, WooCommerce doesn’t have a timer feature you can use for hosting flash sales. But you can create flash sales that end when product inventory runs out.
To do this, you’ll need to use the Stock management feature in the product editor. Open the item you want to put on sale and go to the Product data box. Click on Inventory and check both the Stock management and Sold individually options.
In the above screenshot, you’ll see a product with a Quantity of 100 units in inventory. Each customer is only allowed to buy one per order.
Next, you can set the sale price by going to the Product data → General tab and entering a new value in the Sale price ($) field. This configuration will make it so that the product on sale can run out, thereby ending the discount.
You’ll also want to set some type of notification on your store homepage or Shop page indicating that there’s a flash sale going on. This will let visitors know there’s a product available for discount and the offer will only last until the product is sold out.
If you want to add a sales timer to WooCommerce, you’ll need to use an extension. Simple Sale Countdown Timer is a great option, as it enables you to set timers for products on sale.
The timers appear on individual product pages. Once the time runs out, the plugin will automatically disable sales prices and return them to their original values.
3. Cart discounts
Cart discounts involve offering lower prices on entire shopping carts, rather than on a product-by-product basis. One way to do this would be to offer a discount on any purchase over $50. You could provide either a flat-fee discount or a percentage-based one.
This is a type of discount WooCommerce doesn’t offer by default unless you use coupons (which we’ll explore further on in this article). So to implement cart discounts, you’ll need to use an extension like Cart Discounts for WooCommerce.
This particular extension enables you to configure multiple types of cart discounts, including:
- Discounts by the total cart amount. This is the most straightforward type of cart discount you can offer. You can use the extension to set cart discounts that only trigger if the total is over $X.
- Cart discounts that trigger past a number of items. This type of discount triggers if you have over X items in the cart. Note that these discounts can be tricky to manage, since customers might be able to purchase multiple cheaper items and still get discounts.
- Discounts for abandoned carts. This approach involves offering cart discounts via email for visitors who have abandoned their purchases, to entice them into completing those orders. According to research, more than 70 percent of shoppers abandon their carts, so recouping even a small number of these potential losses can be a big win.
- Discounts by the cart weight. If you sell physical items, weight plays an important role due to shipping costs. One creative way to offer cart discounts is to take weight into consideration. This makes sense when you’re selling products that are both heavy and expensive (so you can afford to offer discounts that offset the shipping costs).
Note that any cart discounts you offer should have set conditions. Otherwise, you open yourself up to potential sales exploits. That’s when visitors find loopholes in the sales mechanics that enable them to save money unfairly.
4. Product category discounts
You might have seen an online store that offers discounts for entire product categories rather than the entire store. This is an excellent way to run sales, because it gives you the opportunity to boost certain styles or departments that aren’t seeing a lot of action.
You can implement this type of sale manually in WooCommerce or by using extensions. The manual method involves bulk editing products in a specific category and setting discounts for them.
To do this, go to Products → All Products and look at the Select a category menu. Click on it and choose the category of products you want to edit.
Once you select a category, click on Filter. This will reload the products page and only show you the items in that category.
To set discounted prices for these products, select all of them using the checkboxes to the left of each item. Then open the Bulk actions menu and choose the Edit option. Next, click Apply.
Locate the Sale drop-down menu and select the option that says Set to regular price decreased by (fixed amount or %). This will reveal a field where you can enter the discount value.
You can set this as either a flat fee or a percentage. To set a flat fee discount, simply enter a number. For a percentage discount, enter the number followed by the percent symbol.
Click on Update and this will set sale prices for all the products in that category. When you’re ready for the sale to end, you’ll need to return to the bulk edit menu under the Products tab to revert all of the category’s items to their original prices.
If you’d rather use an extension instead of the bulk editor, consider using Category Discount WooCommerce. This plugin adds a new item to your dashboard that enables you to set discounts for all products in a category.
This is a free plugin with a premium version. The functionality you’ll need is included in the free tool.
After installing and activating the plugin, go to WooCommerce → Product Category Discount. This will open a page including a list of all the existing product categories on your website. For each category, you get the option to set either a fixed amount or a percentage-based discount.
Once you choose a type of discount, set a value for it using the Amount ($) field for that category. Then check the Apply box for that category, and that’s it! When the sale ends, you can set the values back to normal using this same configuration screen.
5. Free shipping offers
One of the main reasons shoppers abandon carts is shipping costs. In fact, 63 percent of all abandoned carts are attributed to this factor. That’s why it can be smart to run sales that offer reduced or free shipping, to encourage visitors to make more purchases.
With WooCommerce, you can do this by creating a new shipping zone and then applying it to the products on sale. Go to WooCommerce → Settings → Shipping. Click on the Add zone button next to the Shipping zones header.
First, you’ll want to set a name for the zone. This is for internal identification purposes only. Next, select what regions to include in the zone. If you only sell to a specific region or country, use this field to indicate what that is.
Note that offering free shipping for every region is not a viable idea under most circumstances. This is because you’ll need to honor those sales, and shipping costs can skyrocket for international purchases.
After setting the region, click on Add shipping method. This will open a window where you can select the shipping method for the region. Your options are free shipping, a flat rate, or local pickups.
For a sale, you’ll want to offer either a flat rate or free shipping. Before choosing an option, you’ll need to run the numbers to see what’s viable for your WooCommerce store. Any choice you make will impact your margins, so make sure you’re not losing money by running this type of sale.
If you choose the flat rate option, you’ll be able to set a value and configure it as taxable or not. You can also choose to include shipping class costs.
Shipping classes are categories for different types of items. Typically, you’ll want to set shipping classes for heavier items so they don’t fall under the same cost structure as less heavy products (since they cost more to ship).
If you choose free shipping, this option will appear under the Shipping methods section for that zone. Click on Edit for that option to configure it further.
The settings window for the free shipping option will enable you to set conditions for this method. You can choose from conditions like using a specific coupon or reaching a minimum order amount, or even a combination.
Set the condition you want and click on Save. Setting no requirements is also an option, but it can make the sale harder to manage. You may end up losing money due to unforeseen shipping costs.
Save the shipping method when you’re ready. Now all that’s left is to tell customers in that shipping zone that you’re offering either free or discounted shipping. When the sale ends, remember to edit this discounted shipping zone or delete it altogether.
6. User-specific or personalized discounts
User-specific discounts are offers that vary from customer to customer. One way to do this is to offer products on sale or with significant discounts for only your most loyal customers.
The easiest way to offer personalized discounts is to use the default WooCommerce coupon system. You can use this system to generate one-use coupons and share them only with specific customers, so they can take advantage of unique discounts.
We’ll show you how to use coupons in WooCommerce in the next section. If you prefer a coupon-less solution, you can use a plugin like Custom WooCommerce Discount for User instead.
This plugin adds a new section to the dashboard, where you can set up custom discount rules for users. To do this, go to Manage Customer Discount and use the Select User menu to choose a WooCommerce customer.
7. Coupon discounts
WooCommerce includes a coupon code system that’s perfect for hosting sales. You can create coupons that offer discounts for any amount. What’s more, you can configure coupons to only work under specific conditions, and set usage limits.
Some of the sales methods we’ve discussed so far can also work using coupons. That includes cart and shipping discounts. We’ll show you how those options work in this section, and provide an overall guide to using coupon codes.
Before we talk about how to create coupons with WooCommerce, note that prospective customers can use them by going to the Cart page when making a purchase. There, they’ll see an option for applying a coupon code before proceeding
