The Dots app has a built-in promotion engine: discounts on items, categories, or the whole order; combo deals; gift items from a spend threshold; happy-hour pricing by schedule. Offers show up in the app with their own banners and apply automatically at checkout — no codes to type, no cashier to convince.
A discount is a tool, not a tax
On a marketplace, "promotions" means you funding the platform's campaign — operators report promo participation eats 5–10% of revenue in campaign months, on top of commission. In your own app the mechanics flip: you pick the goal, the discount size, and who sees it. A 15% discount on Tuesday afternoons costs you margin only on orders that would not have existed otherwise — that's the whole point of scheduling. The margin math of doing this well is in promotions that don't kill your margin.
Threshold offers do the average-check work: "free dessert from $25" moves a $19 basket to $25+ for the cost of a dessert. On a typical delivery order, that trade is strongly in your favor.
How it works in the Dots app
You create a promotion in the admin panel: choose the type (percent off, fixed amount, gift item, combo), the scope (item, category, order), the schedule, and the audience. The app renders the offer with its banner, marks discounted items in the menu, and applies the deal in the cart automatically. Start and end dates mean campaigns switch themselves on and off — no midnight menu edits.
Every promotion is tracked to the order, so in the analytics you see exactly how many orders and how much revenue each campaign produced — not a guess, a report. Combined with push campaigns, an offer reaches every customer who installed the app within minutes, at zero ad spend.
Who gets the most out of it
- Venues with pronounced dead hours — schedule-based pricing fills the 15:00–17:00 valley.
- Brands moving customers off marketplaces: a direct-channel discount smaller than 30% commission still leaves you ahead.
- Kitchens pushing average order value with combos and threshold gifts.
Related features
Branded app with promotions, cashback, and push campaigns — launched in about two weeks.