36 terms from Shopify promotions, gifting, bundling and offer measurement — defined in plain language, with the trade-off each one hides rather than just the dictionary meaning. Grouped by area: gifting terms · discount mechanics · upsell and cross-sell · bundles · cart surfaces and ux · measurement.
A free product given when a cart meets a condition — a spend threshold, a specific product, or a collection. The core product price is untouched, which is why GWP protects your price positioning in a way a percentage discount does not. See gift with purchase.
The cart subtotal at which a reward unlocks. Thresholds are normally set 15% to 30% above average order value — high enough to require an extra item, low enough that one item closes the gap. Always measured on subtotal, never on total, so shipping and tax cannot make the rule unpredictable. See spend threshold gift.
Inserting the gift into the cart automatically when the cart qualifies, rather than asking the shopper to claim it. Shopify's native discounts cannot do this — they discount a gift the shopper has already added. See auto add a free gift.
A gift with purchase where the shopper chooses from a short set of approved gifts instead of receiving one fixed item. Removes the single failure mode of a fixed gift — that the shopper does not want it — and produces pick-rate data on which products have real pull. See pick your gift.
Several gifts at escalating spend levels: one at $60, a better one at $120. The second tier only works if it is reachable from the first, which usually means spacing tiers at roughly one extra item apart. See tiered rewards.
What the gift costs you, as opposed to what it retails for. The threshold has to cover the cost; the shopper evaluates the retail price. A gift with a wide gap between the two is the economically efficient choice.
Buy one, get one. Either free or at a discount, and either the same product or a different one. A specific case of Buy X Get Y, and the most recognised promotional phrase in retail. See BOGO and Buy X Get Y.
The general form: buy a quantity of X, get Y at a discount or free. On Shopify this exists as a native automatic discount, with one critical limitation — it discounts Y if Y is in the cart but does not add Y for the shopper.
Buy a quantity from a qualifying set and the lowest-priced of them becomes free. Costs less than a flat percentage on expensive carts, because the discount always lands on the smallest line. Requires a narrow price band in the qualifying set to stop shoppers gaming it. See cheapest item free.
Per-unit price falling as quantity rises: 2 for 10% off, 3 for 15%. The discount is paid only on incremental units, and three units in one order share one pick, pack, and shipment — so unit cost falls at the same time. See volume discounts.
Two or more discounts applying to one order. Shopify permits it only within its class rules and only when each discount explicitly allows the other's class. Usually a margin mistake even where it is permitted, because each discount was priced as if it were alone. See discount stacking.
Shopify's three categories — product, order, and shipping. Combination is governed class by class. Two product discounts generally do not stack; a shipping discount and an order discount normally can.
A discount Shopify applies without a code when the cart matches its conditions. Silent when it fails to match, which is what makes it hard to debug. See why automatic discounts do not apply.
An explicit ranking that decides which offer fires when several qualify for one cart. Sits above Shopify's combination settings: priority decides what is presented, combinations decide what checkout honours. See offer priority rules.
Moving the shopper to a higher-value version of what they are already buying — a larger size, a better model, a longer subscription. Acts on the same need.
Adding a different, complementary product alongside the one being bought. Acts on an adjacent need, which is why a cross-sell must be a complement rather than a substitute to work.
A cross-sell driven by purchase-pattern data rather than editorial choice. Strong where real pairings exist and weak on products with no natural companion. See frequently bought together.
An offer presented in the cart or cart drawer. The right surface for decisions about how much to spend — thresholds, gifts, cross-sells — because the cart already exists. See cart upsell.
An offer shown after payment, on the order confirmation flow. Carries no risk to the original conversion because the order is already placed.
An optional priced extra attached to a product the shopper is already buying — gift wrap, engraving, a warranty. Kept as its own line rather than encoded as a variant, which avoids multiplying the variant matrix. See product add-ons.
The share of qualifying orders that include a given add-on or cross-sell. The main health metric for an add-on, and the number that tells you which ones to remove — every prompt costs attention on the way to checkout.
A curated set of products sold together at one price. Strongest for gifting and for products that genuinely work as a system; weakest when the shopper wants two of the three components.
Any N items from an eligible set, at a set price or discount. The shopper chooses, you control the eligible set. Fixed pricing requires a narrow price band; percentage pricing tolerates a wider one. See mix and match.
A guided flow where the shopper fills a defined number of slots. The highest average-order-value mechanic in gifting and food, and the most sensitive to flow design — a half-built box is abandoned more readily than a half-filled cart. See build your own bundle.
The products that count toward a bundle or quantity offer. The eligible set is the real cost control in any shopper-chosen offer: a wide price spread inside it invites gaming.
A live indicator of distance to a threshold. Converts a stated rule into the shopper's position relative to it, which is what creates motion. Most effective on carts already near the line. See cart progress bar.
A Shopify extension point that lets an app render inside your theme through the theme editor, with no Liquid edits and nothing left behind on uninstall. The reason to prefer block-based apps over ones that require pasted code. See adaptive theme styling.
A behavioural trigger firing when a shopper appears to be leaving. The one context where interrupting costs almost nothing, because the alternative is a lost session. See free gift popup.
The learned habit of skipping anything that looks like an advertisement. The reason offer widgets that do not match the theme get filtered before they are read, regardless of how good the offer is.
Revenue divided by orders over a period. The headline metric most offer programmes target, and the reference point for setting any spend threshold.
The sequence viewed → accepted → checkout started → order placed, measured per offer. Each gap has a different cause: acceptance points at the offer, the checkout-start gap at the cart, the final gap at checkout. See offer funnel analytics.
Revenue from orders where an offer was shown and accepted. An upper bound rather than incremental revenue, because some of those carts would have converted anyway. Only meaningful when read next to the offer's cost.
Revenue that exists because of the offer and would not have existed otherwise. Measurable only against a holdout — running the offer for some traffic and nothing for the rest.
A share of traffic deliberately shown no offer, used as the control. The only instrument that separates what an offer added from what it merely touched. See offer A/B testing.
Accepted offers divided by offers viewed. A useful diagnostic and a poor goal: a lower threshold always raises acceptance and frequently lowers margin. Judge offers on revenue or margin per session instead.
The confidence that a measured difference between variants is not noise. Offer tests are powered by conversions rather than sessions, so low-volume stores should test large changes and accept an honest "too small to tell" over a confident number built on thirty orders.
An upsell moves the shopper to a higher-value version of what they are already buying — a larger size or better model. A cross-sell adds a different, complementary product alongside it. Upsells act on the same need; cross-sells act on an adjacent one.
BOGO is a specific case of Buy X Get Y, with X and Y both equal to one. Buy X Get Y is the general form and covers buy 2 get 1, buy 3 get 1 at 50% off, and every other combination.
Revenue influenced is the total from orders where the offer was shown and accepted — an upper bound, because some of those carts would have converted anyway. Incremental revenue is what exists only because of the offer, and it can only be measured against a holdout.
A share of traffic deliberately shown no offer, used as a control group. It is the only way to tell whether an offer created revenue or merely touched revenue you already had — which is the difference between a lever and a cost.
Because lowering the threshold always raises acceptance and often lowers margin. Acceptance is a useful diagnostic for whether an offer is attractive, but revenue or margin per session is what you are actually trying to grow.
A Shopify extension point that lets an app render inside your theme through the theme editor, with no Liquid edits required and nothing left behind when the app is removed. It is the reason to prefer block-based apps over ones that ask you to paste code into a theme file.
