Using Bounceback Offers in Paper Icon Campaigns

A lot of retail establishments do paper icon campaigns, but relatively few seem to have embraced the bounceback offer. That’s why I was glad to see the bounceback coupon at the left from Denny’s.

Right now Denny’s, a chain with more than 1,500 restaurants across the United States, is selling and displaying paper icons benefiting Toys for Tots, the toy giveaway charity. When you buy the paper icon at the left, Denny’s gives you the bounceback coupon below for an order of Pancake Puppies, which are sort of like doughnut holes.

Pancake Puppies, which usually sell for $2, almost cry out for a cup of coffee or hot chocolate to accompany them, so Denny’s is betting that when I redeem the coupon that I’ll buy at least that and, more likely, think of the Pancake Puppies as a kind of appetizer for a larger meal.

For that reason, almost every retailer that sells paper icons should probably try and figure out some kind of bounceback offer appropriate to their business.

Back in the day at Children’s Miracle Network we used detachable coupons, but Denny’s approach has its advantages, namely in branding and expense. Denny’s approach is almost certainly less expensive and more flexible.

In the restaurant the paper icons were prominently displayed behind the host’s station. But they are hardly the only thing displayed in the restaurant. Right now Denny’s are plastered with their Christmas promotion for Arthur Christmas, an animated film about Santa’s workshop where it is the elves who run the show, not the Fat Man himself. Arthur Christmas is on the windows and the front door, on the placemats, in the menu and on the menu. That is, there are menu items named for Arthur.

Because that’s the case, the paper icon campaign sort of feels like a bolt-on to the existing movie promotion.

But the bounceback offer tells me that Denny’s took this paper icon campaign very seriously indeed.

If you do paper icon efforts, you should, too.

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