Comparison of Redemption of Print and Electronic Coupons Research in Progress

Promotion via coupons is one of wide-spread marketing tools on Internet. But despite the growth of E-business printed coupons remain in use. We, therefore, compare the performance of printed and electronic coupons as measured by their redemption rates. The coupons come in different set-ups: The consumer can be granted a fixed discount, a certain percentage off the purchase price, or a gift. Therefore, it is also of interest what works better in terms of redemption and, in the case of discount offers, how the size of the discount influences the redemption rate. We estimate response functions based on empirical data of 185 coupon campaigns distributed over various print outlets and web sites. Preliminary results indicate that E-coupons did not perform significantly better than off-line coupons. The inverted U-shape of the redemption curve could be confirmed for print coupons