Doing regular special promotions online are a great way to boost interest in your company and boost sales. Unfortunately, not all promotions have a long lasting effect and this can lead business owners to believe they are ultimately a waste of time, money and resources. We believe, just like every aspect of internet marketing and SEO, that special promotions can only reap longer term effects if they are designed to do so. If a company offers a discount on a certain product for a week, and nothing else, then the promotion will have no real impact on the over-all business. The secret to promotions is to create additional activity which does have a lasting effect on the business, and which can be benefitted from long after the promotion has ended. Here are some tips to help your promotions have more of a positive effect on all aspects of your online business. Encourage customers taking part in the promotion to register or engage with your in some way. This could be via social media or by supplying their email address. This will allow you to contact them again, and it will build your database, so even after the promotion you have this information about qualified leads – people who were interested in your product. Make sure every promotion has a call to action which directs the lead to your website. This boosts traffic and ensures you get something from each person who decides to take advantage of the special promotion. Another call to action can be to ‘like’ or ‘share’ the post. Tap into the trends of the day. Try to develop special promotions that tie in to special occasions, holidays or in to subjects that are trending. For example, if the topic of Easter is trending on social media, and you have an Easter promotion, it will show up in searches and on news feeds as well as trending topics. By being aware of what people are talking about and taking an interest in, you can gauge your promotions to suit. It’s better to have one really good, generous promotion per month, than to have a mediocre, cheap one, once a week. Think carefully about the nature of your promotion. If it is a competition, make sure the price is desirable. If it is a discount offer, make sure it is for an amount that will be attractive to the customer. If it is the promotion of a certain product, then make sure it’s a product that people are interested in. Special promotions work, there is little doubt about that. Ensuring your promotions are of as much benefit to you as your customers take a little more planning and developing but it is possible and when achieved, will reap real and lasting rewards.