Gift app that doesn't kill site speed, works with product variants, and auto-adds gift to cart?

[Ben31]

[First post was rejected as spam so if it appears twice, that's why]

Hi There,

Essentially, we'd prefer an 'Auto-add gift to cart' check-box on Shopify's built-in automatic discounts. A super basic requirement for running successful promotions in 2020 but Shopify seem to insist this is advanced and keep directing us to apps.

But after trialing 7 top-rated gift and promotion apps we've discovered that:

• Most of them are large, so have too many features, cost $30+ a month, and load heavy JS libraries which kills your speed score
• Many of the apps don't work with product variants
• Many apps require the gift to be a live product on your store (it's a gift, we don't want people to see it or buy it separately)
• The simple app we found (EasyGift) only worked 60% of the time, meaning 40% of orders didn't come through with the free gift

Apps trialed:

• Selly United
• EasyGift: Auto Add to Cart
• Free Gifts by Secomapp
• Gift Box
• Infinite Options by ShopPad
• Upsell for Products
• Gift On Order

What we're looking for:

• Select qualifying product(s) and variants
• Select gift product(s) and variants
• Gift product doesn't have to be live (yes, some apps allowed this)
• Auto-add the gift to cart with a 0-100% discount when qualifying product(s) added
• Works every time, even if customers have items left in their cart from a previous session
• Priced $10 a month or less
• Not load jQuery or other large JS libraries/files

Bonus feature:

• Display custom text on collection listings and product pages

Does anyone know of a basic free gift app that meets the requirements above?

Any help would be much appreciated.

Cheers

Ben

[Ben31 · Accepted solution]

Well, after searching for newest apps first, we've just discovered Really Automatic Discount:

• A simple, reasonably priced app
• It uses Shopify's built-in automatic discounts so works with variants
• After installing, it doesn't add any new files/snippets etc to our theme
• It doesn't seem to add liquid code which is annoying to clean up if deleted
• It only loads a small 10k JS file which hasn't effected our speed score

It's simple and looks nice but was a little clunky to setup - plus it displays French every now and then. But we've tested it and it does what it says on the tin - nice.

Will report back once our promotion starts next week incase others are looking for something similar.

[KJ6]

Hi Ben

Just wondering how you are getting on with this App as it sounds promising. We tried Gift Box and it was a no due to not being able to select products effectively to give offers on. I would love to see you store to see if this might work for us too.

Thanks

[Ben31]

Hi There,

Funny you ask, we'd just discovered that the gift wasn't being added because we'd run out of 'Prints'. 'Prints' are website views but the app doesn't warn you when you're out of prints so you have have to keep an eye on it which is a needless extra thing to worry about.

The app also has what looks to be French in some places and has a quirky setup so be sure to read the instructions on the syncing feature. Overall, it has worked great and we liked the way it uses Shopify's built-in automated discounts. It's been the best all round app for us (performance/simplicity/cost) however, the 'Prints' system is a bit painful.

Also, it's a bit embarrassing the way Shopify thinks free gifts are a premium, app-only feature. There are probably 100s of posts from merchants wanting a simpler, less painful way of doing free gifts which is a basic requirement for successful marketing campaigns - it's nothing special in 2020 so it's silly.

If Shopify added an 'Auto-add to cart' tickbox onto automatic discounts (see attached for a visual) this needless marketing headache would go away.

Hope that helps.

Cheers

Ben

Feature Request

[Ben31]

'Really Automatic Discount' no longer functions and the developer was unresponsive - we uninstalled.

The original problem still stands, basic gift with purchase on Shopify is painful.

As noted above, a simple checkbox under automatic discounts would cease this madness.

Auto-add free product to cart

[crashbandicoot]

@Ben31 I've been interested in a gift app with the exact same requirements as yours. Have you found anything that's ticked enough of your boxes? 

[Ben31]

I'm sorry to report that we haven't - it's incredibly frustrating.

We had to run our last campaign as a Shopify automatic discount but it doesn't auto-add the gift to the cart. Needless to say that despite being the same deal, it didn't go nearly as well which makes sense - who reads 5 point bullied instructions for how to get your gift?

We're tired of Shopify to be honest, we're currently testing Wix and Big Commerce. Pros and cons to each but Shopify seem less concerned with the nuts and bolts. It's a major to move but we're serious so plan for testing and migration to take 6-8 months.

Another huge let-down to Shopify is content management - minimal layout control with home page sections but zero control for the rest of the site. It's a real challenge if your products don't fit into cookie-cutter templates.

Anyway, sorry I don't have better news.

Cheers

Ben