No offense to you or your firm, but fuck coupon codes. When I go to Trader Joe's for groceries, I work out what I want to eat and note the prices. When I make one of the occasional trips to Safeway I spend half my time trying to match up what I went there to buy with the particular coupon that's running this week or that my wife added to loyalty card, and more time attempting to decrypt my receipt after I get home to see if I succeeded.
Coupons are just a way of creating psychological anxiety about missing a good deal, an archetypal 'dark pattern'. That sort of thing actively drives people like me away from your business. I know I'm not a mainstream consumer, but IMHO neither is the average domain registrant.
You can say that to any firm then. Given our razor thin profit margins, the pricing is there for a reason. The coupon codes are also there simply to sweeten the deal.
Bear in mind the products we're mostly represent cost a low $10. If we had more wiggle room on pricing, we'd offer low pricing all the time. It's just not feasible for a business like ours to do 24/7.
What I'm saying is that I am more quality- and convenience- sensitive than I am price-sensitive. Not because I'm rich, but because the mental overhead of coupon deals etc. carries a cost that typically exceeds the saving on the coupon. If you make the service sufficiently attractive, you can raise your prices. Admittedly this is a bit challenging when your firm is branded as 'namecheap' in order to attract the most price-conscious consumers, but companies can and do rebrand themselves.
I mean, Google is charging more than you, and it's not like they couldn't win a price war if they were so inclined - they could probably sell domains for $1/year without significant damage to their bottom line. Maybe it's time to get out of the 'cheap' box.
Coupons are just a way of creating psychological anxiety about missing a good deal, an archetypal 'dark pattern'. That sort of thing actively drives people like me away from your business. I know I'm not a mainstream consumer, but IMHO neither is the average domain registrant.