Promotional Offers: Manage Sales, Discounts, and Campaigns

Types of Promotional Offers

| Type | Description | Example |
|------|-------------|---------|
| Sale/Discount | Price reductions with promo codes | "25% off with code SUMMER25" |
| Promotion | General promotional campaigns | "Free shipping this weekend" |
| Product Launch | New product announcements | "Introducing our new collection" |
| Seasonal Offer | Holiday or seasonal sales | "Black Friday: Up to 40% off" |
| Flash Sale | Limited-time urgent offers | "24-hour flash sale" |
| Bundle Deal | Package or combination offers | "Buy 2, get 1 free" |
| Loyalty Reward | Customer appreciation offers | "VIP early access sale" |

Creating an Offer

1. Navigate to Offer Calendar from the main menu
2. Click Create Offer or click directly on a calendar date
3. Fill in the offer details:

• Name — Short, descriptive title (e.g., "Memorial Day Sale")
• Offer Type — Select from the types above
• Description — Full promotional details
• Start Date / End Date — When the offer is active
• Discount — Percentage off or fixed amount
• Promo Code — Customer-facing code (e.g., SPRING2026)
• Landing URL — Where to direct customers
• Terms & Conditions — Any restrictions

4. Click Save

The offer starts in Draft status. Set status to Active when ready to go live.

Offer Status Lifecycle

| Status | Meaning |
|--------|---------|
| Draft | Created but not yet active. Won't appear on content. |
| Active | Live and showing on published content during flight dates. |
| Paused | Temporarily disabled. Won't show even if within dates. |
| Expired | Past end date. Automatically updated by system. |

How Offers Appear on Content

When you have an active offer within its flight dates, ILLIXIS automatically injects promotional banners into your published content.

The Promo Widget

ILLIXIS installs a lightweight JavaScript widget on your connected sites (Shopify, WordPress, Webflow). This widget:

1. Checks for active offers based on your current date
2. Displays banners at strategic positions in your articles
3. Shows different banner styles (primary featured banner, compact subsequent banners)
4. Hides automatically when no offer is active

Banner positions:

• After every second H2 heading in your content
• Maximum 3 banners per page
• First banner is larger (primary style)
• Subsequent banners are compact

Pre-Promotion Window

Offers can appear BEFORE their official start date to build anticipation. This is controlled by your tenant settings.

Example: If your offer starts December 15 and pre-promotion is set to 7 days, banners start appearing December 8 with "Coming Soon" messaging.

To configure: Go to Settings → Brand Settings → Pre-promotion Days

Scheduling and Caching

How Scheduling Works

1. Flight Dates — Each offer has start and end dates
2. Status Check — System checks status = active AND today between start/end dates
3. Automatic Expiration — Offers auto-expire when end date passes (midnight sweep)

Caching Strategy

Promo banners are cached for 1 hour to ensure fast delivery to your site visitors.

Cache invalidation triggers:

• Editing an offer (immediate)
• Deleting an offer (immediate)
• Status change (immediate)
• Midnight system sweep (for date-based transitions)

If you change an offer and don't see updates immediately, wait up to 1 hour or contact support to force cache clear.

Viewing Your Offers

Calendar View

Go to Offer Calendar → Calendar View to see offers displayed by date:

• Green border = Active
• Gray border = Draft
• Orange border = Paused
• Red border = Expired

List View

Go to Offer Calendar → List View for a sortable table:

• Filter by status, type, or date range
• See promo codes and discount amounts at a glance
• Quick actions (edit, delete, generate content)

Generating Content for Offers

Each offer can have a linked content brief:

1. Open the offer detail
2. Click Generate Brief
3. ILLIXIS creates a calendar brief optimized for your promotion
4. Generate article, social posts, and email content from the brief

Combining with Holidays

The Offer Calendar integrates with the Holiday Calendar. When creating an offer:

1. Click Create Offer from Holiday on any holiday
2. The holiday name and date pre-populate
3. Marketing angles carry over from holiday insights
4. Content generation considers the holiday context

Example: Creating a "Valentine's Day Sale" offer from the Valentine's Day holiday automatically suggests romantic marketing angles.

Product Recommendations Fallback

When no active offer exists, the promo widget can display product recommendations instead:

• Based on article content matching
• Shows relevant products from your catalog (if Shopify connected)
• Keeps banner slots useful even without active promotions

Troubleshooting

"My offer isn't showing on my site"

• Verify status is Active (not Draft or Paused)
• Check that today's date is between start and end dates
• Ensure the promo widget script is installed on your site
• Wait up to 1 hour for cache to update after changes

"Banners appear in wrong positions"

• Widget targets H2 headings in article content
• Archive/homepage pages are excluded (only single posts)
• Check that your theme uses semantic article markup

"I see the old banner after updating"

• Cache may not have cleared yet (1-hour TTL)
• Hard refresh your browser (Ctrl+Shift+R / Cmd+Shift+R)
• Check that your edit was actually saved (offer status shows correct dates)

"Pre-promotion isn't working"

• Verify pre-promotion days setting in Brand Settings
• Offer must have status = Active (not Draft)
• Pre-promo only works for future offers, not past ones

Related Features

• Calendar Briefs — Generate content from holidays and offers
• Offer Calendar Dashboard — Full calendar planning guide
• CMS Connectors — Install promo widget on your site