Incentives Overview

Incentives are the discounts, rewards, and perks you offer customers to encourage them to subscribe — and to keep them subscribed over time. Ordergroove supports several incentive types, including percentage and dollar-off discounts, free shipping, loyalty rewards, and gifts with purchase. You can run more than one at a time and adjust them as your program evolves.

This article covers the available incentive types, where to configure them, and how to choose the right combination for your program.

Where to configure incentives

All incentives are managed in the Subscriptions > Flex Incentives page of your Ordergroove Admin at rc3.ordergroove.com/incentives/. The page is divided into two sections:

• Automatic Incentives — program-wide or condition-based incentives that apply automatically when customers meet your specified criteria.
• On-Demand Incentives — unlocked by customer actions such as entering a discount code. This includes winback and retention/cancel prevention incentives.

Initial vs. recurring order incentives

Ordergroove distinguishes between two types of orders:

• Initial order — the customer's first order when they sign up for a subscription, placed through your checkout
• Recurring orders — all subsequent orders placed automatically by Ordergroove on the subscriber's behalf

By default, incentives you configure in Ordergroove apply to recurring orders. On Shopify, you can additionally configure a separate Initial Order Incentive (IOI) — a discount applied only to the first order at checkout.

A common structure is a higher discount on the initial order to drive sign-ups, with a lower (but still compelling) recurring discount to maintain profitability over time. For example: 20% off the first order, 15% off all recurring orders.

Types of incentives

You can run more than one incentive type at a time. For guidance on choosing the right combination, take a look at Choosing the Right Incentive.

Subscription discounts

Discounts are the most common subscription incentive. You can offer a percentage or fixed dollar amount off the product price or order subtotal on every recurring order. On Shopify, you can also set a separate discount for the initial checkout order.

• % off — e.g., 15% off every recurring order
• $ off — e.g., $5 off every recurring order
• Applied at the item level (per product) or order level (order subtotal)

Note: Discounts apply to the product price only. They do not apply to shipping costs or taxes.

Free and discounted shipping

Shipping incentives apply to recurring subscription orders only. The shipping rate on the initial checkout order is managed within your eCommerce platform.

Options include:

• Free shipping — on all recurring orders regardless of order value
• Free shipping with a minimum threshold — e.g., free shipping on orders over $50
  • Note: Any minimum thresholds will apply to all offer profiles. For example, you can't specify a region.
• Flat rate shipping — a fixed shipping cost, optionally waived above a threshold
• International shipping rates — separate rates can be configured for international orders

Shipping promotions are typically combined with a discount. If you have margin concerns about offering free shipping unconditionally, a threshold is a good middle ground.

Best Deal Guarantee

Best Deal Guarantee tracks the price you send for each product in your product feed over a rolling lookback window (typically 14–30 days, configurable by you). When a recurring order is placed, Ordergroove finds the lowest price seen within that window and uses it as the base price for that order — then applies any subscription discounts on top.

Example: A product is priced at $20 in week one, drops to $15 in week two, then rises to $25 in week three. With a 30-day lookback window, your subscriber pays $15 — the lowest price in the window — before any subscription discount is applied.

Best Deal Guarantee is a strong option if your prices fluctuate frequently or you run regular promotions. It reassures subscribers that they'll never overpay on a recurring order.

Note: Best Deal Guarantee only tracks prices sent through your product feed. It does not apply site-wide coupons, promotions, or discount codes from your eCommerce platform.

Retention rewards (Nth order)

Retention rewards give subscribers a bonus on a specific order number — rewarding them for staying in the program. These are sometimes called "Nth order" discounts. You can set Nth order for # of orders on a particular subscription, or # of orders overall for a subscriber. Ex if a customer is subscribed to both chocolate and vanilla, you can count those orders together.

Examples:

• Every 4th order free
• A gift with every 3rd order
• 15% off every 5th order

Retention rewards are configured using the Nth Order condition in the Flex Incentives Builder. Rewards are triggered by order number, not by time — so "every 3rd order" means the 3rd, 6th, 9th recurring order, regardless of when they ship.

Subscribe More, Save More

Subscribe More, Save More gives customers a deeper discount based on how many active subscriptions they have with your store. The more they subscribe, the more they save.

Example: 5% off for one active subscription, 10% off for two, 15% off for three or more.

This structure rewards loyalty, increases average order value, and creates a stronger reason for subscribers not to cancel — each cancellation reduces their discount tier. Some of our merchnats use this model to give a deeper discount per order based on a subscriber's number of active subscriptions.

Configure this using the Subscribe More, Save More condition in the Flex Incentives Builder.

Gift with Purchase (GWP)

Gift with Purchase adds a free item — such as a deluxe sample or branded gift — to subscription orders. GWPs are a great way to introduce subscribers to new products and reward them for staying in the program.

• Gifts can be added to the entire order or to specific items within an order.
  • If a GWP is added to the order-level, the customer will only get one GWP no matter how many items are in the order. If the GWP is tied to specific item(s), they might 'stack' GWPs and receive multiple.
• Ordergroove manages GWPs on recurring orders; GWPs on the initial checkout order are managed by you within your eCommerce platform

Important: GWP items are added to orders at the time of placement and do not appear in Ordergroove's reporting, admin dashboard, or Subscription Manager. To report on GWP items, use your eCommerce platform's order reporting.

On-demand incentives

In addition to automatic incentives that apply to all subscribers, Ordergroove supports on-demand incentives — applied manually to specific subscribers, typically for retention or appeasement.

• Shopify Discount Codes — customers can apply a discount code at checkout (with Discount Codes 2.0) or directly to an existing subscription. See Shopify Discount Codes.
• Cancel Flow retention offers — incentives presented to subscribers when they attempt to cancel, to encourage them to stay. See Cancel Flows for more information.
• One-time discounts through the API — custom discounts applied programmatically to a single order. See Advanced One-Time Discounts.
• Loyalty Point Redemption — Encourage subscribers to stick around by awarding loyalty points redeemable toward future purchases; configure via 3rd Party Integrations.

How incentives stack

Multiple incentives can be active at the same time. Here's how they interact:

• Subscription discount + free shipping — both apply independently. A subscriber can receive 15% off their order subtotal and free shipping simultaneously.
• Best Deal Guarantee + subscription discount — Best Deal Guarantee determines the base price first; the subscription discount then applies on top of that lowest price.
• Shopify Discount Codes 2.0 + Ordergroove incentives — discount codes are additive, meaning they apply on top of existing Ordergroove incentives. See Shopify Discount Codes 2.0 for full stacking behavior and known limitations.
• Conditional incentives — when multiple conditions are configured in the Flex Incentives Builder (e.g., a product-group discount and an Nth-order reward), they follow the evaluation logic described in the Flex Incentives Builder article.

Note: Ordergroove does not read site-wide promotions, flash sales, or coupons from your eCommerce platform. Recurring order pricing is based on the price in your product feed plus any Ordergroove incentives. If you want subscribers to benefit from a site-wide sale, pass the sale price through your product feed.

Choosing the right incentive

Four questions to guide your decision:

1. How does your subscription incentive compare to your site-wide promotions? If you regularly run 15% off sales, a subscription should offer at least as much — otherwise there's no reason to subscribe.
2. What are your competitors offering? If your category defaults to percentage discounts, you likely need one too. If competitors don't offer discounts, a small discount or GWP may be enough to stand out.
3. What do your customers actually care about? Some segments respond better to free shipping than discounts. Use your customer data to guide this.
4. What's profitable long-term? A 50% discount may drive sign-ups but erode margin. Design your incentive structure to be sustainable over many recurring orders, not just the first.

For a deeper guide, see Choosing the Right Incentive.

Frequently asked questions

Does my subscription discount apply to shipping or tax? No. Subscription discounts apply to the product price only. Shipping and tax are not discounted unless you configure a separate shipping incentive.

If I change my discount, will existing subscribers automatically get the new rate? When you create a new discount, you can use the Update All option to apply it to all existing subscribers, or leave it unchecked to apply it only to new subscribers going forward.

Will subscribers benefit from my site-wide sales? Not automatically. Ordergroove prices recurring orders based on your product feed, not your storefront. To extend a sale to subscribers, either pass the sale price through the feed or enable Best Deal Guarantee with a lookback window that covers the sale period.

Why doesn't my Gift with Purchase item appear in Order Logs or the subscriber dashboard? GWP items are added at order placement time and are intentionally not reflected in Ordergroove's reporting, admin, or Subscription Manager. This is expected behavior. Check your eCommerce platform's order history to confirm the gift was included.

Can I use Shopify discount codes alongside my Ordergroove incentives? Yes, with Shopify Discount Codes 2.0 (currently Early Access), discount codes are additive on top of Ordergroove incentives.

What's next?

• Choosing the Right Incentive
• Flex Incentives Builder
• Shopify Discount Codes 2.0