Promotion of service plan sales can be done through offering a special price, or a free subscription period, or both. Promotion is valid only within a promotion period. Sales outside the promotion period are not eligible for promotion. Promotion can be applied to service plan sales if at least one of three conditions is met:
- Sales order includes respective promotion code.
- This is an up-sale to a plan listed in promotion definition.
- A “global” promotion is set up. “Global” promotion is a promotion without promotion code and without up-sale condition. It is used only if the first two types of promotions are not applicable.
Only one promotion can be defined for a service plan subscription period for a specific promotion period. Different subscription periods of the same service plan can be eligible to different promotions. If service plan sales are eligible for both discount and promotion, promotion is applied to the sales while the discount is ignored.
So, if promotion is applicable to sales order, we set promo prices and record a link to promotion. Recurring billing orders have prices taken from current state of promotion.
In case of renewals there are two options:
- The subscription is renewed for another period. In this case the system checks if a promotion or a discount is applied to this subscription period, as for usual sales order.
- The subscription is renewed for the same period. Here system's behavior depends on a value of subscription option Freeze Prices (default value is "No", but provider can change it at any moment). If the option value is "No", the system checks if a promotion or a discount is applied to this subscription period, as for usual sales order. If the option value is "Yes", recurring billing orders have prices taken from the subscription.
Billing offers you a comprehensive yet simple mechanism of carrying out service promotions. Promotion in Billing is defined for particular time interval. For example, if your promotion campaign is planned in December, you state interval from 1st through 31st of December. Promotion interval is the time when customer has to place an order to get promotion bonus(es): special prices, free subscription period or both. Sales outside the promotion period are not eligible for promotion. Promotion can be applied to a number of service plans. For each service plan there is a promotion period created within promotion. Promotion period defines which promotion bonus customer gets: discount on particular service plan, additional period of free services provisioning or both. Only one promotion can be defined for a service plan subscription period for specific promotion period. Different subscription periods of the same service plan can be eligible to different promotions. Promotions are applied to basic service plans and to up-sale service plans differently:
- For basic service plan there is a promotion code in promotion properties that has to be input. When you add a promotion period to a promotion, you make respective service plan subjected to the promotion campaign. When customer purchases such service plan in the online store or from their control panel, he is able to enter its promotion code and get a promotion bonus. Customer may obtain promotion code from one of the web sites or other sources participating in your promotion campaign. The code can also be included in URL, so that when customer clicks on a button or a banner containing the URL, he is automatically redirected to online store with promotion code already input.
- For up-sale service plans promotion code is not necessary. Instead, it is necessary for its parent service plan to be subjected to promotion. Thus, on every customer's attempt to purchase an up-sale service plan, Billing checks whether its parent service plan is listed in promotion definition. If so, customer gets a promotion bonus.
Promotions Application Priority
Promotion is applied to a subscription and is valid for all future orders of that subscription, while a discount is only applied when a specific customer purchases discounted service plan. If service plan sales are eligible for both discount and promotion, promotion is applied to sales while discount is ignored.
When customer places an order for existing subscription (e.g., purchases additional resources), the system first checks if that subscription has its prices promoted.
When customer places an order for a new subscription, the system first checks if that subscription is eligible for any of promotions, which is listed below (in order of appearance):
- Promotion by Promo Code.
- Promotion for Parent Plan.
- Global Promotion.
Promotion Limits Applicability
There are four limits that restrict the promotion:
- Subscription limit is the maximum number of discounted subscriptions that can be sold. For example, setting 100 would mean that only first 100 sales will get promotion bonuses. Subsequent sales shall use regular prices.
- Per customer Limit is the maximum number of discounted subscriptions that can be purchased by a single customer. For example, setting 3 would mean that a customer can purchase only 3 plans at discounted price, leaving 97 discountable purchases to other customers.
- Promoted upsell subscription limit is the maximum number of discounted up-sales per customer per parent service plan. For example, setting 3 for Linux Hosting plan would mean that a customer can buy only 3 discounted up-sales to all his Linux Hosting subscriptions, regardless of the number of those parent subscriptions.
- Limit per parent subscription is the maximum number of discounted up-sales per parent subscription. For example, setting 2 would mean that a customer can buy 2 discounted domains for one Linux Hosting subscription, then another 2 discounted domains to the second Linux Hosting subscription, and so on.
All four limits operate together. For example, a customer can buy 2 discounted domains for one Linux Hosting subscription but only 1 discounted domain to the second Linux Hosting subscription because promoted up-sell subscription limit allows only 3 discounted up-sales to Linux Hosting plans. The same thing would happen, if the subscription limit is used up by other customers.