Special and discounts are great ways to encourage sales of any particular product. These can be used to get rid of unsold merchandise quickly or encourage an influx of traffic. Luckily, it’s relatively easy to set osCommerce special items from the admin panel.
Some business owners find a great deal of success using social media marketing tools in conjunction with running a special. It’s all about getting people to visit the store and improve brand awareness. And creating special items in osCommerce is the beginning of that strategy.
Today, I’m going to show you how to set up specials within the osCommerce system. This goes along the lines of customizing your catalog, and it gives you the ability to engage consumers who want to save a few bucks.
Creating osCommerce Special Prices
From the osCommerce dashboard, click the button on the left for “Catalog.”
A list of items will drop below Catalog. Click the “Specials” link at the bottom of the list.
You’ll see a list of example specials built into osCommerce. Let’s say we want to create a new one.
Click the “+ New Product” button under this list.
Use the drop down window to select a product on your store.
Input a new price in the “Special Price” field. You can use a specific dollar amount or use a percentage. If you use a percentage, osCommerce will automatically calculate the sale price.
Set a date you want the special to finish. As soon as this date arrives, osCommerce will automatically set the product back to its original price. You can leave this blank if you want the special to continue indefinitely. This is probably more ideal if you simply want to get rid of all the inventory as quickly as possible.
Click the “Save” button on the bottom right.
Your special is now set and running. Now you can go onto things like Instagram marketing and share your price reduction among followers. If your account is popular, it may encourage sales in a relatively short amount of time.
Endless Possibilities
Specials and discounts are used often in a variety of marketing tactics. For instance, you can easily set holiday deals for things like Black Friday or Cyber Monday. Either way, shoppers love the idea of saving money at check out. Cutting prices on select items is a good way to demonstrate this to your patrons.