You launched a workplace discount program. You announced it to employees. You checked the box. And now…crickets.
If that sounds familiar, you're not alone. Many employers invest in workplace discount programs with the best intentions, only to watch them collect dust in an employee portal nobody visits. The difference between what companies offer and what employees want is more common than you'd think and more costly than most HR leaders realize.
Employee preferred discounts, travel perks, and everyday savings can be powerful tools for retention and morale. But when programs are poorly designed, badly communicated, or simply misaligned with what employees want, they tend to underperform.
So, what are the mistakes that keep otherwise promising programs from thriving? Let’s dive into the 10 most common mistakes employers make—and how to fix them—so your workplace discount program becomes something employees genuinely love, not just another forgotten portal.
The frustrating part? Most of these programs aren't failing because of budget. They're failing because of assumptions. HR teams assume employees will seek out benefits on their own. They assume one announcement is enough. They assume that "offering" something is the same as employees actually using it. It's not.
Think about how hard consumer brands work to earn a customer's attention (and those customers are actively shopping.) Your employees aren't in shopping mode when they're between meetings or trying to hit a deadline. That means the bar for clarity, and ease of use is even higher for workplace benefits than it is for a typical retail experience. Your program needs to meet employees where they are, not where you assume they are.
The 10 mistakes below aren't obscure edge cases. They show up again and again across companies of all sizes and industries. The good news is that recognizing them is more than half the battle.
Key takeaways:
- Most workplace discount programs fail due to poor design, communication, or relevance, not budget.
- Employees love instant discount access; friction kills adoption before it starts.
- High-quality employee travel perks and everyday savings are among the top drivers of perceived benefit value.
- Long-term employee engagement requires consistent promotion, not a one-time launch email.
- The best programs treat employees as consumers with real preferences, not a captive audience.
Mistake #1: Treating the Launch Like the Finish Line
Rolling out a workplace discount program and then going silent is one of the most predictable ways to kill adoption. A single announcement email, a mention in the company newsletter, and maybe a Slack post tends to be the extent of marketing for many programs.
Here’s the reality: employees are busy. Inbox overload is real, and your benefits portal is probably not top of mind on a random Tuesday afternoon. Engaging employees long-term doesn’t happen at launch; it happens through consistent, creative promotion that keeps the program front-of-mind. Approaches like these are explored in 30 Days of FUN Employee Engagement Ideas, which highlights how sustained visibility drives participation.
How to improve it: Build a 12-month communications calendar. Use multiple channels like email, Slack, intranet, manager shoutouts, and even physical signage if you have an office. Tie promotions to seasons or life moments: summer travel season, back-to-school, or the holidays. Think of your program like a plant that needs watering all year, not just at planting.
Mistake #2: Offering Discounts Nobody Actually Wants
Not all discounts are created equal. Coupons for obscure software subscriptions or retail brands employees have never heard of don't move the needle. They may technically count as a benefit, but they don't create the kind of perceived value that drives engagement.
Most employees value everyday essentials like groceries, gas, dining, entertainment, and travel. If your program misses these categories, employees quickly conclude it’s not worth their time. Designing discount offerings that genuinely resonate with employees often requires thinking beyond generic vendor bundles, similar to approaches discussed in Best Employee Discount Ideas for Small Businesses
How to improve it: Survey your workforce before launch. Ask what they spend money on and what would make their lives easier. Use that data to curate your offerings rather than defaulting to whatever a vendor bundles together. Think of it like creating a playlist for your employees—you wouldn’t put in songs they never listen to!
Mistake #3: Ignoring Employee Travel Perks
Travel is consistently one of the highest-value benefit categories for employees. Hotels, airlines, car rentals, and even cruises generate more excitement than most other discounts and employees talk about them. In fact, modern travel benefits are evolving rapidly as spending behaviors shift, particularly among cost-conscious workers, a trend explored in Travel Perks for Budget-Conscious Employees.
Yet many employers either skip travel entirely, offer only a token discount, or bury travel perks deep in the portal where no one sees them. That’s a huge missed opportunity.
How to improve it: Elevate travel perks as a marquee benefit. Promote them during peak planning periods like spring break, early summer, or the holidays. Share real savings stories when possible. When employees hear “I saved $500 on my family vacation thanks to this program,” engagement spreads faster than a viral TikTok.
Mistake #4: Making It Hard to Access Discounts
If employees have to create a separate account, remember a new password, navigate a clunky portal, and enter a promo code that may or may not work, they won't bother. Employees love instant access. Friction is the enemy of adoption.
This is an underappreciated but critical point. The best discount in the world means nothing if the path to redemption is complicated, confusing, or unreliable. Every extra step between an employee and their savings is another opportunity for them to give up and move on.
How to improve it: Prioritize platforms that offer seamless single sign-on (SSO), mobile-friendly interfaces, and instant discount delivery. That can be through a digital code or a direct link to a discounted booking. Test the redemption experience yourself before rollout and audit it regularly.
Mistake #5: Underestimating the Role of Managers
Your managers are the most trusted communicators in your organization. When they talk, employees listen. When they ignore something, employees notice that too.
Most workplace discount programs completely bypass the manager layer. HR sends a company-wide email. Managers are never briefed. Nobody on the team ever hears about it again. And then HR wonders why utilization is at 4%.
How to improve it: Make managers advocates, not bystanders. Give them a simple one-pager that explains the program and highlights two or three benefits most relevant to their team. Encourage them to mention it in team meetings. Share usage data with them so they can see impact. When managers champion a benefit, adoption follows.
Mistake #6: Buying the Cheapest Option and Calling It a Benefit
There’s a difference between a discount program that delivers real value and one that simply exists. Cutting corners by choosing vendors with poor deals, thin networks, or bad user experiences creates a benefit employees don’t care about.
Low-value discounts don’t just underperform, they can actually damage your credibility. If employees say, “We have a discount program, but it’s not worth it,” it sends a message that the company is just checking a box.
How to improve it: Evaluate vendors rigorously. Look at network breadth, redemption experience, and employee satisfaction. Ask for case studies and a demo that mirrors your workforce demographics. Remember: quality beats quantity every time.
Mistake #7: Failing to Personalize or Segment Communications
Sending the same generic email about your discount program to a 22-year-old entry-level employee and a 52-year-old director with three kids will almost certainly miss both of them.
Effective promotion of employee preferred discounts requires understanding that your workforce has diverse needs, life stages, and spending priorities. A young employee might care about restaurant deals and entertainment. A parent might prioritize back-to-school savings and travel packages for the family. A remote employee might be particularly interested in home services or tech.
How to improve it: Segment your communications wherever possible. Use employee data you already have like location, family status, and job level to customize which discounts you highlight. Even simple segmentation dramatically improves relevance, and relevance drives engagement. Or partner with a discount loyalty provider that can send these personalized communications for you.
Mistake #8: Neglecting Remote and Distributed Employees
Remote work changed the employee benefits landscape permanently. Yet many workplace discount programs are still built around an assumed fully in person workplace. This comes out as local retail discounts, city-specific dining deals, or perks tied to an office location.
For a remote team these offerings feel irrelevant. When remote employees see discount programs that don't make sense for where they live and how they work, they disengage, not just from the program, but from the broader sense that the company sees and values them.
How to improve it: Audit your discount portfolio for geographic diversity. National and online retailers, travel deals that work anywhere, streaming services and delivery discounts are all useful for remote teams. Make sure the program works just as well for someone in rural Montana as it does for someone in Chicago.
Mistake #9: Never Measuring What Actually Matters
"We have a discount program” is not a benefits strategy. Without measuring utilization, employee satisfaction, and the financial value delivered to employees, you have no way to know whether your investment is working or just wasting money.
Many employers track only registration numbers, if they track anything at all. But registration isn't engagement. An employee who signed up on day one and never returned isn't benefiting from your program and you're not benefiting from the investment.
How to improve it: Define meaningful KPIs before launch (a good discount program vendor should be able to help guide you on what matters.) Track active monthly users, redemption rates by category, estimated dollar value saved per employee, and employee satisfaction scores tied to benefits. Send periodic surveys to your employees asking about the discount program.
Use that data to iterate, drop what's not working, and double down on what is.
It's also worth benchmarking against industry standards. What does strong utilization actually look like for a program like yours? What's a realistic redemption rate by category? Your discount program vendor should be able to provide this context. If they can't, that's a red flag worth paying attention to.
Mistake #10: Thinking About Discounts as a Perk, Not a Strategy
This is the root cause behind most of the other mistakes. When HR leaders view workplace discount programs as a nice-to-have rather than a strategic retention and engagement tool, they underfund them, underpromote them, and under-optimize them.
Employees who feel their benefits address their financial wellbeing report higher job satisfaction, stronger loyalty, and greater likelihood of recommending their employer to others. In a competitive talent market, a well-executed discount program isn't just a perk, it's a differentiator.
Employees love instant discount experiences, travel savings, and everyday values. For many employees, meaningful discounts can have a real, tangible impact on their household budget. That kind of impact builds loyalty.
How to improve it: Elevate the discount program conversation to a strategic level. Tie program success to broader HR goals around retention, engagement scores, and benefit satisfaction. Make it someone's job to manage, promote, and continuously improve the program.
The Bottom Line
Workplace discount programs have enormous potential to boost employee wellbeing, drive engagement, and give your company a competitive edge. But that potential is only realized when programs are thoughtfully designed, actively promoted, and continuously optimized for what employees actually value.
The good news? Most of these mistakes are fixable. You don’t need a massive budget just clarity about what your employees want, a platform that delivers it, and a strategy that keeps the program relevant year-round.
If your current program isn’t gaining traction, start by tackling two or three of these mistakes. Or consider adding high-value perks, like travel, that your employees actually use and love. Programs like Access Perks help workers stretch their paychecks and experience more.
The difference between a discount program employees ignore and one they love usually comes down to execution, and that's entirely within your control! It's also worth remembering that employees notice when benefits improve. You don't have to wait until open enrollment to make a change or add a high-value perk. A mid-year upgrade to your discount program can create a noticeable lift in how employees feel about the company right when you need it most, like during a tough quarter or a period of organizational change.
Ready to talk to an expert about how Access Perks can help you keep your workforce refreshed and engaged?
