6 Back to School Coupon Ideas to Boost Retail Sales in 2022

Back to School shopping is big business. In 2021 customers spent a huge 37.1 billion dollars, according to the National Retail Federation. Although customers are still spending plenty of money, they’re keen to find special offers, sales, and Back to School discount coupons.

But what’s in it for you? As well as providing a short-term sales boost, you can use coupons to collect customer data. It is also a great product promotion strategy and way to connect and engage with your audience. That includes priceless intel such as contact details, shopping habits, tastes, preferences, and more.

Are you looking for engaging ideas for your Back to School campaign? Discover our ready-made Back to School promotion templates and save up to 70% of production time! Social media giveaways, contests, mini-games, quizzes and coupon campaigns… You name it – we have it all!

And you can make it fun at the same time! Read on to find out how – with these 6 Back to School coupons.

How to distribute Back to School coupons and promotional codes

Before we dive into the fun part (designing your promotions), let’s talk about how coupons work.

Creating coupons is as easy as using the Easypromos platform. If you want to validate individual promotional codes for each user, then all you have to do is upload the list of codes. It really is that simple.

When it comes to giving coupons and codes away, you can choose the format. You can offer coupons as an instant download when users sign up or send them via email. And you can choose whether to share codes in alphanumeric, barcode, or QR code format.

Boost sales with a Back to School coupon campaign

Let’s start with the easiest way to distribute Back to School coupons because there’s nothing easier than sharing your contact details and downloading a discount voucher! The Back to School shopping season is when your customers are looking out for deals and special offers.

Here’s an example of a simple Coupon campaign that can be designed by any brand associated with Back to School shopping. All you have to do is share your promotion with your social media followers and website visitors and ask them to fill in a registration form in order. In return, they will obtain a discount for their Back to School shopping.

This simple type of promotion helps to boost sales, drive traffic to your website and footfall to your store, and also expand your mailing list for future marketing purposes. You also have a great opportunity to establish meaningful customer relationships by giving away discounts to your store.

You can try our Back to School Distribute Coupon Codes DEMO to check the real user experience for yourself. And if you like it, we prepared a customizable template for your own promotion.

Gamify your Back to School campaign and reward participants with discounts

Online users love playable promotions; it might be because they provide entertainment, or maybe because they’re a quick escape from reality. Incentivizing participation is an effective way to attract more potential participants and the prize is normally the biggest motivation to enter online campaigns. However, you don’t necessarily have to raffle big prizes; if the main objective of your Back to School strategy is to boost sales you might as well give away discount codes to all participants of your marketing game!

Here’s an example of a branded Puzzle game that can be launched by ANY brand as part of their Back to School strategy. But instead of providing just a simple registration form, you can invite users to rearrange puzzle pieces that – when put together correctly – reveal an image of your best-selling products, your slogan or even your campaign poster!

However, instead of raffling a big product bundle, you can reward all registered participants with a Back to School coupon! Apart from boosting sales, you also get to generate engagement and contact details for your brand.

Did you know that all Easypromos games can be fully customized? Edit the texts, add your logo and change the design to reflect your branding – it’s a simple way to reinforce brand awareness and recall.

Make sure to try our Back to School Puzzle DEMO, and if you like this Back to School promotion idea use our ready-made template to launch your own game with a discount coupon.

Raffle Back to School vouchers among registered users

Sharing Back to School coupons with shoppers is a great way to make them loyal to your brand. They’ll feel valued, appreciated, and understood. And chances are, they’ll think of your brand next time they have to purchase something that you sell or offer.

There are direct advantages for your marketing strategy, too. You can use discount coupons as a powerful motivation for customers to share information or try specific products. The Easypromos Back to School Entry Form Giveaway app can also be a great tool whenever looking to collect more information about customers. If you raffle a specific product, you know that all the people that participate in your promotion would like to try it! Or, like in the following example, all the participants that enter your promotion have school-age children.

Here’s an example, aimed at parents of kids heading back to school. This brand offered a £50 Back to School voucher for school uniforms. All the entrants had to do was fill in their personal details.

Apart from expanding their mailing list, the organizer reinforced their brand awareness and tapped into customers’ loyalty. They also knew which leads could be targeted with school and kid-themed communications in the future!

Survey your customers to help plan your campaign

Did the previous example of collecting info from your followers sound interesting? There is a way to find out even more about your existing and potential customers! Launch a Survey promotion to get even more details from your leads. You can ask targeted questions about how your customers shop, what products they prefer, how they feel about your brand and more.

By offering Back to School coupons to all contestants, you’ll incentivize more customers to take part. And the more responses to your survey, the more useful it is!

For this type of promotion, we’ve picked an unusual example. Here’s a survey that was run by a school itself!

While the School Board prepared for the new school year, they wanted to know more about students’ and parents’ opinions. They asked families to fill in the survey together because the focus was on learning how to help the community. And the prize? Two generous $100 vouchers for groceries.

Launching a Survey as part of your Back to School campaign is a great idea if you’re looking to conduct market research. The participants will be more likely to share their views and opinions if they receive a coupon that’ll help them save money during the Back to School shopping season.

It’s easy to validate coupons in-store and online with the Easypromos Validation Portal. Create unique promotional codes and assign them to individual customers.

Challenge your followers to a pop quiz and give away Back to School coupons

Set up a Knowledge Quiz to test your customers’ expertise in school subjects, your products or your company. This is also a great opportunity to educate customers about your brand, and collect customer details. Don’t forget to reward correct answers with Back to School discount coupons. To attract more participants, you can also raffle a big prize among all participants that correctly answered all the questions.

In the example above, you can see how a fun example of a Spanish Knowledge Quiz. Participants tested their Spanish skills and after registering their contact details they obtained a 30% discount off Spanish classes in a private language school.

It’s time for your own Back to School quiz! Try our Back to School Knowledge Quiz DEMO and test how to use it for your brand.

Create memories with first-day-of-school photos

If you’re on social media, you’ve probably seen parents sharing cute photos of their kids on the first day of school. Those tiny uniforms! Those enormous backpacks! You can tap into that user behavior to run Back to School promotions, too.

With the PhotoFun app, you give people the tools to create postcards and photo memories at the start of a new school year. Users just upload a photo, then decorate it with cute school-themed frames and stickers in the virtual photobooth:

Then you can offer a coupon reward for every photo creation, or ask people to vote for a favorite to receive a grand prize. Apart from collecting user-generated content you also generate new leads and strengthen customer relationships.

This app has to be seen to be believed. Give a go to our Back to School PhotoFun DEMO and create your own branded promotion.

Class is over – time to try these promotions out for yourself! Remember, it’s free to set up an Easypromos account and start drafting your promotions. We can’t wait to see all the fun and creative ways you’ll share your Back to School coupons.

If you need extra inspiration or resources for your Back to School campaign, then make sure to visit our Back to School hub. In case of doubts or questions don’t hesitate to Chat with us!