The lousy economy has consumers clipping coupons in numbers not seen in years. According to a study by Simmons Research Bureau, 89 percent of consumers say they are more likely to use coupons in a recession, and 87 percent say they prefer to shop at retailers that offer coupons. While that’s great news for businesses looking to boost sales and land new customers as part of a direct mail marketing plan, much of the conventional wisdom about coupon redemption is wrong, says Peter Meyers, vice president of marketing at Toronto-based ICOM Information & Communications, a division of Epsilon Targeting. Here, he dispels seven of the top myths:

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1. Short-term expirations drive immediate sales. Fact: Consumers need more time. In many cases, a quick expiration cuts redemption far more than any increase in value can make up.

2. Higher value always equals higher redemption. Fact: Value alone isn’t enough. Maximum redemption comes from an optimal value-expiration sweet spot.

3. Store-brand users aren’t worth pursuing with target coupon offers. Fact: As store brands upgrade their quality, fewer store brand consumers will be price-centric and more will be quality and feature conscious. They’ll often redeem targeted offers at rates as high as other competitive users.

4. Targeting the most loyal users of a competitor’s product yields the best return on a coupon program. Fact: Light to moderately competitive users are more likely to try a new product and will do so on a lower-value coupon offer.

5. A sample is a must for driving high redemption rates. Fact: There are other factors much more likely to drive redemption rates. Some of those include expiration, value, current versus competitive user, and frequent versus infrequent coupon user.

6. Coupon offers on frequently purchased items are redeemed quickly, so an expiration of less than six months will do. Fact: Targeted offers with expirations shorter than six months generally see only half as many redemptions as longer-term offers.

7. Current users of a product don’t need a long expiration period to get them to redeem a coupon offer. Fact: Even for current users, to gain more than two-thirds of potential redemptions, an offer must be good for six months at a minimum, and in the 10- to 12-month range for personal care categories like skin and beauty products.

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