Here’s what most Shopify merchants don’t realize until they dig into the numbers.
That “WELCOME10” code you’re plastering across your site isn’t just failing to drive new customers, it’s actively training your audience to wait for discounts, leaking margin to coupon-sharing sites, and making it impossible to know which campaigns actually work.
When Shopify recently increased its product variant limit from 100 to 2,048 (a massive 20x jump), it signaled that complexity in product catalogs is growing, and the old playbook of blanket discounts across your entire store no longer cuts it. Brands scaling past seven figures can’t afford to treat discount codes as a tactical afterthought. Your competitors are becoming more sophisticated in segmentation, personalization, and attribution.
Today’s guest analyzed 162,000 discount code sets to determine what sets high-growth brands apart from everyone else. Cara Marin is the Product Owner of Bulk Discount Code Bot at Seguno—a platform trusted by over 20,000 brands, including Vuori, SodaStream, and Allbirds. Her team recently published a benchmark report that reveals exactly how successful brands structure their discount strategies, and the findings are eye-opening. Whether you’re running your first campaign or optimizing at scale, this episode breaks down why unique, personalized discount codes are becoming the default for brands that understand attribution matters as much as conversion. Let’s dive in.
What You’ll Learn
✅ Why generic discount codes are quietly sabotaging your margins — and how “WELCOME10” style codes end up on coupon-sharing sites, train customers to never pay full price, and make it impossible to know which marketing channels actually work versus which ones just show up to take credit for sales that were happening anyway.
✅ The unique discount code approach that stops coupon abuse cold — how personalized codes with random character strings create a one-to-one relationship with each customer, can only be used once, and give you clean attribution data while eliminating the risk of codes circulating forever and eating your margins months or years down the road.
✅ What 162,000 discount code sets reveal about how successful brands actually discount — the benchmark data showing that high-growth stores segment offers by customer behavior, set strategic expiration dates to protect future margins, restrict codes to specific collections, and use personalization to reward the right behaviors without training everyone to wait for sales.
✅ The two discount campaigns every brand should start with — why converting your new subscriber offer to unique codes takes less than five minutes, immediately improves attribution accuracy, and lets you test different percentage thresholds (10% vs. 15% vs. 20%) to see what actually moves the needle for your specific audience instead of guessing.
✅ How to stop training your entire audience to expect discounts — the segmentation approach that lets you give new customers one offer while VIP repeat buyers get something completely different, so you’re rewarding the behaviors you want without conditioning everyone to wait for your next sale before they’ll buy anything.
✅ Where discounting strategy is headed in 2026 — why personalization is becoming table stakes as AI raises customer expectations across email, SMS, and lifecycle marketing, and how leading brands are making customers feel valued with targeted offers while actually protecting profitability instead of eroding it.
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Episode Summary
Steve had a chat with Cara Marin, Product Owner of Bulk Discount Code Bot at Seguno, to talk about something most merchants are getting wrong: discount codes. If you’re still running generic codes like “SAVE15” across your entire store, this conversation reveals exactly why that approach is costing you money—and what successful brands do differently.
The episode starts with Seguno’s journey from a simplified email marketing platform built entirely inside Shopify to a full suite of tools that now includes one of the most widely adopted discount code solutions in the ecosystem. Over 20,000 brands—including names you’d recognize like Viore, SodaStream, and Allbirds—use the platform because it solves a problem most merchants don’t even realize they have: you can’t actually tell which discounts drive conversions versus which ones just cannibalize sales that would’ve happened anyway at full price.
Cara walks through how unique discount codes work. Instead of “WELCOME10” that anyone can use forever, these are personalized codes with random character strings that create a one-to-one relationship with each customer. They can only be used once, which immediately stops them from ending up on coupon-sharing sites where they’d eat your margins indefinitely. But here’s what makes this powerful: it’s not just about preventing abuse. You can create targeted offers for different customer segments—new subscribers get one discount, win-back customers get another, VIP repeat buyers get something else entirely—all without training your whole audience to wait for sales.
The heart of the episode is Cara’s benchmark report analyzing over 162,000 discount code sets. The findings show how sophisticated brands actually approach discounting: they set expiration dates to eliminate future financial liability, restrict codes to specific product collections to protect margin on certain SKUs, and segment offers based on customer behavior instead of blasting the same deal to everyone. One surprising insight: 46% of discount codes expire without being used, which isn’t waste—it’s smart strategy. It means brands are protecting themselves from indefinite margin loss while still giving customers incentive to convert.
Cara’s implementation advice is straightforward: start by converting your new subscriber offer to unique codes. It takes less than five minutes, immediately improves your attribution, and lets you test different percentage thresholds to see what actually works for your audience. The second campaign to tackle is win-back offers for lapsed customers. Just those two give you clean data on acquisition versus retention costs, which matters when you’re making budget decisions.
The conversation wraps with where this is all headed: personalization is becoming the baseline expectation. Just like AI has raised the bar for email and SMS, customers now expect offers tailored to their behavior and purchase history. Brands still using generic codes will feel increasingly outdated compared to competitors making customers feel valued through strategic, personalized discounting. This isn’t theory—it’s what the data from 20,000+ brands shows.
Strategic Takeaways
👉 Start by converting your new subscriber offer to unique codes this week. It takes less than five minutes and solves two problems at once: you’ll finally know whether 10% vs. 15% actually drives more conversions (real data instead of guessing), and you’ll stop the code from ending up on coupon sites where it circulates forever. Run it for 30 days, look at the conversion data, then adjust based on what actually happened—not what you assumed would work.
👉 Put expiration dates on every single discount you create. The benchmark data shows 46% of codes expire unused, which sounds wasteful until you realize it’s protecting you from future financial liability. Without expiration dates, you’re creating debt your CFO will stress about later. With them, you can test freely, experiment with different offers by segment, and know exactly when the risk window closes. This is how high-growth brands maintain margin discipline while still discounting strategically.
👉 Restrict codes to specific collections instead of your entire catalog. If customers can use a code on everything, you’re probably giving away margin on products that would’ve sold at full price anyway. Use collection restrictions to protect high-margin items and bestsellers, while discounting products that actually need the push. You can’t do this with generic codes, but it’s essential for staying profitable as you scale.
👉 Segment offers by customer behavior, not one-size-fits-all discounting. The real power here is giving different segments different offers: new customers might need 15% to convert the first time, while VIP repeat buyers might value free shipping or early access more than percentage discounts. When you personalize based on purchase history and engagement, you stop training everyone to wait for sales and start rewarding the specific behaviors you want.
👉 Mine your discount data for patterns you’re missing. When you analyze unique code usage, things get interesting: maybe 75% of people used the code (solid engagement), but 13% bought without applying it (they were ready to pay full price—so why offer the discount?), and 46% let it expire (they weren’t ready yet). This granular view shows you who actually needs incentives versus who you’re unnecessarily leaving margin on the table for.
👉 Make win-back campaigns your second implementation priority. After new subscriber offers, win-back campaigns for lapsed customers deliver the best ROI because you’re re-engaging people who already know your brand but need a reason to come back. Test different approaches with unique codes—percentage discount vs. free product vs. free shipping—and track which one actually brings customers back versus which just sounds good. The attribution clarity here completely changes how you think about retention.
Guest Spotlight
Cara Marin
Product Owner, Bulk Discount Code Bot at Seguno
Cara Marin runs product development for Bulk Discount Code Bot at Seguno, a company built around one clear mission: creating better marketing tools specifically for Shopify merchants. While Seguno is best known for its email marketing platform—which stands out by being entirely embedded inside Shopify for simplicity and speed—Cara’s work focuses on the unique discount code generator that’s become essential for over 20,000 brands.
Her team recently dug into 162,000+ discount code sets to figure out what separates high-growth brands from those bleeding margin and struggling with attribution. The patterns they found shaped how Seguno’s platform actually works: automated expiration dates cut off future financial liability, collection restrictions keep codes from being used on products that don’t need discounting, and one-time-use unique codes stop coupon abuse before it becomes a problem.
What makes Cara’s perspective worth listening to is how she thinks about making sophisticated tactics actually usable for merchants at any stage. Whether you’re running your first subscriber campaign or dialing in lifecycle marketing for a seven-figure operation, her approach is the same: start simple—convert one campaign to unique codes, measure for 30 days, then expand from there. No need to overhaul everything at once. The platform even includes automatic discount audits that scan all your Shopify discounts (even ones created outside the app) to flag risks like missing expiration dates or unrestricted codes that could end up on coupon sites.
Cara sees discounting headed in one clear direction: personalization becoming the baseline, not a nice-to-have. Customer expectations keep rising across email, SMS, and every other touchpoint, and discounts are no exception. Her work at Seguno is focused on making that level of personalization realistic for brands of all sizes, not just enterprise teams with dedicated resources. That’s why you’ll find the platform trusted by brands like Viore, SodaStream, and Allbirds—companies that get that strategic discounting means more than just throwing 10% off at everyone.
Links & Resources
Featured in This Episode:
Resources Referenced:
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Like Reading? Here’s the Full Episode Transcript 👇
Steve Hutt:
Welcome back to eCommerce Fastlane. I’m your host, Steve Hutt. Today we’re going to talk about discount codes because if you’re running a Shopify store, you are very likely using them. The game has really changed. Customers, fortunately or unfortunately, are expecting them. Your competitors are definitely running discount codes. And for most brands, they are a critical conversion lever.
Steve Hutt:
But here’s what I’m seeing. Most merchants are treating discount codes tactically. They’re throwing out promo codes. And I’m wondering, are the brands really winning by doing this? Are they truly discounting strategically or is it actually a growth tool? I think that’s the problem. There really is a shift happening right now. Even last month, Shopify made a massive platform change. They increased what they call the product variant limit. It was 100, and now it’s 2,048. That’s a 20x jump.
Steve Hutt:
For brands that have very complex catalogs, this changes a lot of things. That’s why I want to have my guest on today. I want to talk about strategic discounting and why it’s essential for the success of a business. My guest today is Cara Marin, and she’s the Product Owner for Bulk Discount Code Bot by a company called Seguno, widely appreciated for their email marketing platform. They’ve branched out over the years with other apps that connect to their main core platform, but their dedicated apps do a lot of things. The product that she manages is currently trusted by more than 20,000 brands—big brands that we all know and love. Viore, which I love, SodaStream (I have one), Allbirds. There’s a whole bunch of brands here that connect to this solution.
Steve Hutt:
Cara’s team has done a lot of work recently, and I want to talk about a PDF that she’s created. It’s a benchmark report that was put together, and we’re going to dig into that one. So, hi Cara. Welcome to eCommerce Fastlane.
Cara Marin:
Thanks so much for having me.
Steve Hutt:
My pleasure. Take me back to the beginning because I want to set the stage about Seguno the company. Inside Shopify, they were always a notable email marketing platform player that I would say, “Hey, you have a couple different options to choose from. You have the Omnisends, you have the Klaviyos. Oh, and by the way, have you heard of Seguno?” I always let people know about that in my early days at Shopify. Can you talk about Seguno the company and its iteration over the last few years?
Cara Marin:
Yeah, so I’m not one of the founders, let’s start with that disclaimer. But Seguno is a software company that has the mission of building better marketing tools for Shopify merchants. Like you said, we’re known pretty well for our email marketing platform where the main differentiator is it’s built entirely inside Shopify and is very simple and easy to use and gets you results without complexity. That’s probably what we’re known the best for. There are other apps in that suite that support it. And then one of the features in the email marketing platform is a unique discount code feature. We learned that a lot of merchants who use a different email marketing platform want a unique discount code generator app that stands on its own. And so that’s what Bulk Discount Code Bot is.
Steve Hutt:
Okay, let’s talk about why you believe it’s an interesting strategy to have. I guess we all know that customers expect something. But I’m curious about the implementation of it because sometimes it’s just very one-off. And then I’m worried about these solutions that scrape coupon codes and reshare them. There’s this whole margin loss problem. Would they have automatically purchased without the coupon code? And then you think about the influencers using their own dedicated coupon code. I want to hear from you first about when did you notice that this is actually a problem and how this solution now solves that problem.
Cara Marin:
Yeah, it’s a great question. First thing, just to make sure everyone’s on the same page. Unique codes are personalized discount codes. So unlike something that’s like WELCOME10, it has a random string of characters, so every person gets a code that’s only theirs. The first thing that comes to mind when people think of unique codes usually is that it prevents coupon abuse. If it’s a one-time use unique code, it can’t be leaked to a coupon sharing site because it can only be used once. And so that’s a great thing. But what makes me really excited about them isn’t actually that, although that’s a good feature. It’s that when you use unique discount codes, you can create targeted offers that are a lot more strategic and effective than blanket discounts. You can offer one customer segment one discount, a different customer segment a different discount. You can base it off of behavior and you can be much more targeted. So you can break that cycle of customers expecting discounts and not being willing to pay full price and at the same time give each customer exactly what they need to convert.
Steve Hutt:
I see. So with Shopify increasing this variant limit from 100 to 2,048, is there a correlation between Shopify’s platform and why this solution works so well? Or is this solution itself just generating this random code that belongs in a one-on-one relationship based on it triggering?
Cara Marin:
I think you’ll be able to speak to the variants better than me. I know about them at a higher level. But one thing that’s important to how our app works, and there are other apps that do the same thing that hopefully work in the same way, is that it’s fully embedded and integrated with Shopify. You can do things like select that this discount only applies to this product or this collection. And that’s another way to just target and ensure that the discount is only being used in the way it’s intended. We actually have a separate feature that comes with your free trial where we’ll run an audit on all of your discounts. You could have never used our app before. It’s just all discounts you have in Shopify. And we’ll look for things like are your discounts restricted to certain collections? Are they restricted to certain customers? Do you have max shipping set, things like that? So that could be handy.
Steve Hutt:
Yeah, I’m looking at this benchmark report that you put together. You analyzed 162,000 discount code sets. What do you think the biggest pattern is that you’re seeing here that separates some of these high-growth brands from everybody else when it comes to how they’re structuring and deploying these codes?
Cara Marin:
Yeah, so there are a few patterns. The first one is they’re using segmentation. So they’re creating different offers for different customer segments instead of just one blanket discount for everyone. The second is they’re using expiration dates. So they’re setting when the discount is going to expire, which creates urgency but also protects them from having this discount code out there forever that could be leaked or used in ways they don’t want. And the third is they’re using collection restrictions. So they’re saying this discount only applies to these products or these collections. And that’s really powerful because it means they can protect their margin on certain products while still offering strategic discounts on others.
Steve Hutt:
That makes a lot of sense. I’ve always been a fan of the expiration date because it creates that urgency. But also, from a financial perspective, it protects the business from having this liability sitting out there indefinitely. Can you talk about the coupon sharing sites? I know Honey is a big one, PayPal owns Honey now. It seems like a lot of them are earning affiliate commissions when they find a code that actually works. There’s a whole business around offering these codes. How does your solution address that?
Cara Marin:
Yeah, so the unique codes are the main way that we address that. Because if it’s a one-time use code, even if it does get leaked to a coupon sharing site, someone can only use it once. So it’s not going to spread and be used by thousands of people. But the other thing is the expiration dates. So even if it does get out there, it’s going to expire after a certain amount of time. So you’re not going to have this code circulating indefinitely. And then the collection restrictions also help because even if someone does get the code, it might only work on certain products. So you’re limiting the damage that can be done.
Steve Hutt:
I see. I’ve read enough around what Honey does. I think a lot of them are earning affiliate commissions when they find a code that actually works. There’s even a whole business around offering these codes to people that have these browser extensions added. But I also feel that your solution makes a lot more sense because when you have expiry dates and you generate 50,000 codes for a Q1 campaign, having an expiration motivates people. They can be circulated all they want, but in your particular case it’s one-on-one to the person. The financial liabilities are gone and then the CFO feels a little more warm and fuzzy that there’s not more margin loss that can happen in the future because these are made on a campaign basis. I think that’s the power of using your solution.
Cara Marin:
Definitely. And I think the reality is we all have a lot to do. We’re all really busy. So if when you’re creating your campaign you don’t have those safeguards in place, then you’re creating this debt for you to come back to later and hopefully remember. If you can just use unique discount codes, set expiry dates, set collection restrictions, things like that, then you can more freely experiment and find these different discounts that are going to be really efficient for your brand and not have that fear that you’re exposing too much risk.
Steve Hutt:
Before we wrap up, let’s say someone’s listening right now and they’re still running generic codes like WELCOME10 or SAVE15 across their whole entire store. What’s one thing that you would want people to do today, starting this week? How should they start thinking about discounting more strategically? What can they learn more about what you’re building at Seguno right now with this Bulk Discount Code Bot? What do you believe the next step should be?
Cara Marin:
The first discount that I usually tell people to do is to change your new subscriber offer to be a unique discount code. It’s really easy, it’s really fast. And then you’re ensuring that they actually sign up for email or SMS and you can start to experiment. What if I offer 15%, 10%, 20%? What if it’s a free pair of sunglasses with purchase? What are the different offers that are going to do best? So I definitely start with the new subscriber. And then the second most popular one in marketing lifecycle is win-back. So if your list is big enough to have a meaningful win-back opportunity, that’s a great second one. Just get started with it. I think there’s a perception that it’s hard, but it’ll take you less than five minutes and then you’ll have it running with unique discount codes. You’ll get that accurate attribution. You’ll have reporting on what’s working and then you can do what I think is really fun and also really impactful—the job of figuring out what are the discounts that my customers care the most about, especially for different customer segments.
Steve Hutt:
I’ve noticed that too. You can really uncover both the risks and the opportunities and say, “Hey, 75% have used this one” or “they’re discount eligible but 13% didn’t use it at all.” Or it’s so interesting. I’m looking at some of the different discounting strategies. It’s so interesting where 46% expired and never used it even though they got it. And that’s interesting. How do you market against that? I think the granular data is there by creating these codes and I think it’s quite interesting. My one last question I’m thinking about right now, just because you’re deep into this industry, where do you see commerce going from a discounting strategy in the next 12 months? I know it’s hard to have a crystal ball or magic wand, but where are we moving towards? Is it more personalization? Is it more segmentation? I’m just curious because you’re obviously building this product and you’re seeing great use cases. Where do we believe the discounting coupon code market is headed? Because in this way we can hedge a few bets and start preparing now.
Cara Marin:
Absolutely. I think it’s exactly what you said and you’ve alluded to a few times, which is personalization. With AI, we now as consumers expect personalization. We expect great personalized experiences everywhere and increasingly so. And discounts are a way—I’m talking about it as the marketer, I’m going to get them to convert—but it also makes the customer feel valued and seen and understood. You reward your loyal customers. You help turn people into loyal customers. I think personalization is going to become the default. And it’s great to see a lot of brands are already really personalizing their email and SMS marketing, but somehow discounts a lot of the time aren’t part of that. For brands that are growing fast, these larger brands, it really is. And so I think more and more it’ll be personalization.
Steve Hutt:
This is amazing. All right, so it’s Bulk Discount Code Bot. You can go to the Shopify app store. Right now you have lots of five-star reviews. You’re at a 4.9 average. Clearly people love the solution. You have a great video there. I’ll put a copy of this guide that you put together, the benchmark report for the end of 2024. I think that will open people’s minds about the research that you found based on these 162,000 code sets that you’ve analyzed. It’s really neat that you put this all together. That’s why I had you on when I saw this. I thought, okay, we need a podcast recording to talk about this because it’s really interesting stuff and it’s impactful. At the end of the day, it helps move the conversion needle ahead, which is what we really want as a brand founder and a marketer. Cara, thanks for coming on the show. Thanks for sharing and I wish you continued success and iteration with this app and Seguno as a company. Thanks again for coming.
Cara Marin:
Thanks, Steve.
Steve Hutt:
Have yourself a great afternoon. Well, that’s it for today’s episode. I’d like to thank you personally for being a loyal listener of eCommerce Fastlane. It’s my hope that this podcast is offering you a ton of value through growth strategies, tactics and exclusive insider tips on the best Shopify apps and marketing platforms. All with my personal goal to help you build, manage, grow and scale a successful and thriving company powered by Shopify. Thanks for investing some time today and listening to the show. I’m so proud and excited that you have a growth mindset and are a constant learner. I truly appreciate you and your entrepreneurial journey. Enjoy the rest of the week and keep thriving with Shopify.
