In the course of promoting a business, there's a good chance that you'll hand out a fair number of coupons. One of the better options available to businesses is the instantly redeemable coupon, frequently referred to as the IRC. You can also go the next level up and include a folded IRC with mail items and product packages. Let's look at how you can maximize your use of the folded IRC.

More of the Same

Especially when you're trying to establish the customer base for a product, there's a lot more to be said for making the second sale than for making the first sale. An IRC with the label or lid of a product is a great way to reward the customer for making that second purchase.

Data, Data, Data

Data-centric marketing is becoming essential to many businesses. Using the codes on the coupon, the IRC can be tied to specific markets. If you have multiple distribution centers, assign a code to each center. This will allow you to gather regional data with the coupons when they're used.

Selling the Next Product

Depending on what your company sells, you may also be able to use coupons to make the next sale of a different product. Suppose a company sells shampoo. There are many logical accompanying items to sell, especially conditioner. The shampoo company can include a folded IRC with the product so that their customers will be incentivized to buy the shampoo and the conditioner together. They go together like PB&J, two products that would be excellent to sell the same way.

Use Quality Printing

You want the redemption process to be as simple and painless as possible. It's critical that every coupon you generate is fully readable by both the customer and any machines that might have to scan it. To accomplish this, you want to be sure that your printing company has a high level of precision in their work.

Catching the Consumer's Eye

The coolest product offer in the world means nothing if the consumer never even sees the IRC. Use a set of colors that slightly offsets the coupon from the rest of the packaging. With a folded IRC, you also want to make sure that the coupon can easily be peeled up from the rest of the product. This process should be completely manual, and it has to be as non-destructive as possible to the product, its packaging, and the coupon.