The Real Deal

Getting Real with the Deals Platform

Linc Wonham — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 23:55:00 GMT

Although there are still some uncertainties about how to succeed in the hyper-competitive daily deals market, one thing is for certain – everyone loves a deal.

So, if your business has been hesitant to market itself through daily deals, why not take the market’s model and implement it onto your own site? That is exactly what logo design business Impact Logos did.

“We had been closely following the clever marketing tactics and conversion tactics that companies like Groupon and Living Social had developed and wanted to apply and test some of these ideas in our own business,” says Impact Logos marketing manager Lara Johnson. “After four months of testing, the results speak for themselves. Overall improvement in e-commerce conversions of 54 percent or more in our business compared to our home page and other landing pages.”

The company used aspects from the daily deal model and applied them to its logo design business. First, Impact Logos developed a heavily discounted deal and then applied a time constraint in order to influence potential customers’ decision-making processes. The company also provided a countdown timer set for seven days in order to emphasize the deal’s timeframe.

“Using a countdown timer showed a big increase in conversions as did designing a clean and uncluttered landing page that was dedicated to marketing the deal,” says Johnson. “At the end of the day, though, what made our foray a success was following Groupon’s model of testing, testing and retesting absolutely everything. We tried to ensure our ideas and results were based on scientific data and not human assumptions. Overall, we believe this model solves one of the biggest obstacles in e-commerce, converting the fence-sitter into a buying customer.”

For merchants that have been uncertain about taking the plunge into daily deals, there are viable options that make the leap less risky. For example, try a solution that allows merchants to have more control over the deals, such as a white label platform like PoweredByTippr, which enables publishers and merchants to create their own branded deals page.

Another solution worth checking out is recently released Save Local from Constant Contact, which gives merchants control over all aspects of deals, such as discount amount, timing and the amount of coupons sold.

Constant Contact Moves into Daily Deals

Allison Howen — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 17:00:00 GMT

Email marketing services provider Constant Contact has launched SaveLocal, an online tool that aims at helping small businesses run effective daily deals.

SaveLocal aims at improving the current daily deal model, which can take deal control away from the merchant. Instead, SaveLocal gives merchants control over deals, allowing them to run deals that financially make sense, incentivize social sharing and drive repeat business.

“We know that deals are something that consumers want today. The great news is that deals can work if they are done right. The problem is that the current options in the deals space just don’t make sense for many merchants, especially small, local businesses,” says Dave Gilbertson, vice president and general manager of Constant Contact’s newly created SaveLocal business unit.

“The current options demand that the merchant relinquish total control of the deal. They require steep revenue sharing and attract deal seekers rather than new, long-term customers. Amazingly, the current options don’t even give merchants the contact information of their buyers to give them a fighting chance of turning those buyers into repeat customers. And unfortunately, all of this can have a devastating impact on the merchant.”

With SaveLocal, merchants have control over aspects of the deal such as the discount amount, the terms of the deal, timing and how many coupons will be sold. Deals can be created and published quickly and are sent to the merchant’s email list and social networks with no additional cost. Merchants only pay a $1, $2 or $3 fee per coupon purchased, depending on the value of the deal.

Since social sharing is effective, SaveLocal enables merchants to reward customers who buy a deal with an additional reward if they share the deal with friends via email, Facebook or Twitter. Additionally, SaveLocal collects contact information for everyone that buys a deal, including permission for the merchant to contact the customer in the future.

Currently, SaveLocal is available for U.S.-based Constant Contact customers, and will be rolled out to other U.S. small businesses and more countries later this year.

RapidBuyr Connects with HP Web-connected Printer Customers

Pete Prestipino — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 17:57:00 GMT

B2B daily deals service RapidBuyr, which is boasting an audience of 40 million, will be delivering deals to HP web-connected printer customers. In the U.S. alone, there is currently an installed base of several million HP web-connected printers equipped to receive scheduled delivery through HP ePrintCenter.

The new RapidBuyr Scheduled Delivery Application enables HP customers to have RapidBuyr’s daily deals automatically delivered to their HP web-connected printers. HP customers will receive an additional 5 percent discount off RapidBuyr's prices.

"HP serves the needs of small businesses with products and services that enable them to work more efficiently and economically," said Philippe Lesage, business development manager, HP. "The combination of RapidBuyr's daily deals service with HP's scheduled delivery capabilities puts the power of group buying and bottom-line cost savings directly in the hands of small businesses to help them grow and prosper."

Daily Deals come to Bank of America

Pete Prestipino — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 17:56:00 GMT

Bank of America is testing out the deals market. The bank will begin testing a service that will allow customers to earn savings from retailers based on their previous spending patterns.

Customers will apparently receive offers through the bank’s website, with discounts being awarded in the form of cash payments once a month. The program works by assessing a customer’s spending. If a Bank of America customer uses their credit or debit card at a sporting goods store, an offer for a discount at that store — or a rival in the same niche — will be received the next time the customer logs in to do their online banking.

The program is built upon software from an Atlanta-based company called Cardlytics, which currently handles rewards programs for four of the top 10 banks and three of the top five prepaid card providers according to its website. The program is paid for by the merchants making the discount offers, not by Bank of America. Chase, Regions Bank and others are offering similar types of discount programs.

Lifetime Value of Daily Deals

Pete Prestipino — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 19:42:00 GMT

Perhaps the most hyped retail business model in the history of commerce, daily deal sites present merchants with a viable opportunity to acquire new customers and generate more revenue over the customer’s lifetime. But it must be done right to be successful.

The concept of customer acquisition is something that daily deal providers actively sell to merchants and advertisers as a key reason for participation. It’s well-documented that buyers enjoy learning about new businesses from daily deal vendors and it is hard to argue they are not high-volume drivers of new business. When it comes to the effect on lifetime value, however, things begin to unravel.

There are many perils to acquisition; anyone who has ever done any marketing can testify to that. What merchants and advertisers offering deals must understand is that deal vendors provide nothing more than a new promotional channel — a medium where consumers turn to find new businesses and save money (see sidebar), but also one in which all the same rules apply. Failures in daily deals are rarely the fault of the deal network itself; as a performancemarketing channel, the merchant/advertiser will get out of a deal exactly what they put into it. The onus is on them to make the deals work.

Perhaps a glimpse into the mechanics of this emerging channel will serve merchants well. The two primary reasons for leveraging daily deal services are to build awareness and to ultimately increase the lifetime value of customers. If you have a good product, there’s no reason not to put that in front of people — and daily deal sites provide an excellent way to do that. But because daily deals tend to eat away at full-price shoppers, their current execution can become nothing more than a break-even proposition for brands. Daily deals are terrific for generating short-term demand, but they have the potential to perform far better if executed properly.

Because daily deal vendors can only help merchants position themselves, merchants have to do these three things:

Understand Profiling: There is currently little in the way of segmentation available from vendors within the daily deal space, but expect this to change over time. Merchants, however, can take the lead by focusing their targeting on new buyers rather than existing ones. An example would be to offer a specific type of discount; a business that makes most of its sales during the day might promote an offer exclusively for use in the evening.

Commit to Tracking: Most offline businesses are not set up to track the effectiveness of marketing campaigns (expect more “loyalty” components to come to daily deal sites in 2012), but it is particularly dangerous for merchants not to track daily deals. Personal information can be challenging to collect, but there needs to be a process in place to identify who redeemed an offer, when, and for how much – if only to validate what the deal vendor is reporting. Merchants using vouchers that adopt some form of tracking are better positioned to upsell new buyers and bring them back for additional business, thereby increasing lifetime value.

Develop a Smarter Strategy: Merchants and advertisers who think outside deep discount strategies may be better positioned to drive greater lifetime value from daily deal marketing. For example, consider promoting a limited number of goods of full-priced merchandise to shoppers. Restaurants might opt to use daily deals for the promotion of tasting menus, for instance. When it is less about the discount and more about the experience, impressed customers are more likely to return often, increasing lifetime value in the process.

Daily deals are here to stay. Merchants who understand the importance of using the channel as a means to not only acquire new customers but also build greater lifetime value will achieve the highest level of success.

Spreebird Stretching its Virtual Wings

Pete Prestipino — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 19:36:00 GMT

Local.com’s Spreebird recently announced that its daily deal service now features a deal ranking technology which evaluates a user’s location and purchase history in order to personalize the ranking.

"Our deal ranking algorithm offers a better way for local businesses to connect with targeted consumers,” said Malcolm Lewis, senior vice president and general manager, social buying, Local Corporation. “By maximizing the chances that a user sees a deal they like at the top of the page, they're more likely to click the ‘Buy’ button – a win-win for both consumers and businesses," said Lewis.

Spreebird users will also now see their favorite school or non-profit at the top of every page. Through its Community rewards program, Spreedbird gives 10 percent of its deal profits to users preferred charity/nonprofit and has already donated more than $650,000.

Saving Money is Primary Reason for Daily Deal Membership

Pete Prestipino — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 20:13:00 GMT

Daily deal vendors are slowly realizing that many of the industry assumptions they have already established are just not holding true. For example, the driving force behind many daily deal memberships (according to a recent Accenture survey) isn’t finding new activities as many would assume but simply “saving money.”

54 percent of survey respondents from households earning at least $150,000 a year subscribe to a daily deal site, compared to 27 percent of respondents from households that earn $35,000 or less a year. And nearly half (47 percent) of people aged 18 to 24 currently subscribe to a daily deal site, compared to fewer than four in 10 (37 percent) of those between 55 and 64.

“The daily deal craze is still strong, especially with young consumers and people with higher incomes who can make their purchases right away,” Tom Jacobson, senior executive, Pricing & Profitability Strategy of Accenture said.

What is important to note in the survey is that the proportion of consumers who belong to daily deal sites increases with income, and those with higher incomes are more likely to belong to several daily deal sites. As a result, Jacobson said retailers must incorporate deal sites into their channel strategies in order to reach this customer segment.

Bing Dumps DealMap, Deals now with 8coupons

Pete Prestipino — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 20:12:00 GMT

Bing’s initial foray into the daily deals market, if you can remember back nine months ago, was through an arrangement with DealMap, a deal aggregator that organized offers by location.

Several months after that deal was made however, DealMap was acquired by Google (which likely led in part to the same’s release of Google Offers), and Bing was forced to honor the contract. The contract has since expired and apparently the software, search and services giant has been actively looking for a replacement – and it found one.

Microsoft now has a new partnership with 8coupons. The buzz indicates that Microsoft will apparently continue partnering with aggregation services, which collect offers from various providers around the Web.

Groupigg Enters Latin American Market

Pete Prestipino — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 20:11:00 GMT

White-label daily deal software provider Groupigg is launching a site aimed squarely at Spanish-speaking citizens. The site is now operational at www.grouppigglatino.com.

“I am very excited to help bring the group buying trend to Latinos,” says Angel Samuel, International Business Development Manager. “Offering a Groupigg site designated to Spanish speakers will make them more comfortable in the buying process because they will be able to read deals in their native language.

Groupigg is currently located in over 230 markets worldwide, providing media outlets with a platform to operate their own daily deal site.

Lifesta and SocialSteals Both Hit the Deal Deadpool

Pete Prestipino — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 20:11:00 GMT

Prepare yourself for an influx of daily deal sites hitting the dead pool in the coming months.

The latest is Lifesta, a secondary market used to buy and sell daily deal vouchers.

Visitors to Lifesta will no longer be able to buy or sell vouchers, but user accounts are going to remain active until early March. During that time, users can download vouchers already purchased and manage vouchers for sale. In an email to customers, Lifesta even went as far as providing a few suggestions for its users to turn to including DealsGoRound, CoupRecoup and CityPockets.

Lifesta joins SocialSteals in the dead pool. SocialSteals, which launched in 2010 and provided access to deals in the Long Island, NY area

Whether the departure of Lifesta and SocialSteals is an indication of cooling in the daily deals market or if the sites were mismanaged (or ill-conceived) from the start is anyone guess, but fewer vendors in the market should enable the best to stand out in the future.

Those London Deals are Calling

Pete Prestipino — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 20:11:00 GMT

There’s an obvious need for daily deal site that serve a national audience, but everyone knows that to succeed with daily deals you have to do something different.

One of the latest entrants into the daily deals market, and an aggregator that seems to take that need for differentiation to heart, is Top Deals London.

A very visually appealing site on its own, aggregates deals from Groupon, Living Social, KGB Deals, Wahanda and others, and plots the deals based on a very attractive map and even makes them searchable.

The site uses icons to indicate to users what exactly they’ll find on the plotted deals with a quick glance at the map. See the cutlery icon and you’ll find a restaurant, find a heart icon and you’ll find something to do health and wellbeing.

Not a game changer in any way, but always important to keep track of all those aggregators!

Slow Start for Daily Deals in 2012?

Pete Prestipino — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 20:10:00 GMT

Can the daily deals marketplace keep up the pace? According to data from Susquehanna Financial Group and daily deal aggregator Yipit, there will likely be a slow start in 2012. More than half of businesses that used a daily deal site in the past will not be doing the same – at least not in the next six months.

What is strangely interesting about the survey is that 80 percent of companies were actually satisfied with their experiences, but 52 percent said they would hold off on repeat deals for at least the first half of 2012.

The survey did reveal that companies who partnered with daily deal sites including LivingSocial and Groupon saw their experience as a positive way to diversity their marketing efforts. Nearly 50 percent said they acquired more customers because of the deal, but just 10 percent said the deals helped boost revenue.

DealFind Daily Deal Apps

Pete Prestipino — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 19:26:00 GMT

Group buying site DealFind launched its iPhone and Android mobile apps to daily deal seekers this month.

The free app provides many of the same features as the Dealfind website, including access to daily deals in geographic areas, deal purchase and redemption of the deal. With smartphone usage at record levels, the daily deal site’s app comes at a crucial time in the development of the industry.

“We are thrilled about the launch of our app,” said Gary Lipovetsky, Dealfind Co-Founder and President. “This app allows us to better serve our customers and provide them with great deals and discounts wherever they are. It also gives our retailers even more opportunities to reach new customers and increase sales during the holiday season and beyond. The retail industry is rapidly changing with users being hooked into their mobile devices nonstop, and our app ensures we are reaching our customers and getting our deals in front of them. The Dealfind app is going to play a major role in our company’s growth moving forward.”

The apps can be found in their respective app markets.

Buyometric Predicts Growth in Daily Deals Sector Despite Email Fatigue

Pete Prestipino — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 19:26:00 GMT

UK-based daily deal aggregator Buyometric revealed that in December 2011, over half of the 7 million UK subscribers to deal providers receive five or more deal emails per day, and that 50 percent of those who receive a high volume of email think it’s too many.

“There has been much talk of a bubble in the daily deals sector, with email fatigue being cited as a possible trigger,” said Buyometric founder Paul Fisher. “It’s clear that daily deal providers need to make some changes in the way they reach out to their customers. While we don’t see any major fallout on the horizon, there will be many changes in the daily deals sector over the coming 12 months.”

So what can the daily deal industry expect in 2012? According to Buyometic’s Fisher, they can expect increased growth, more competition and improved targeting.

The improved targeting element is clearly a must for the burgeoning deals industry. According to Fisher and Buyometric, men are “turned off” by the untargeted nature of the main deal providers and so new male focused offerings or better targeting by existing providers will be necessary to engage the group.

Consumer Control of Daily Deals Brought by Mobilize.me

Pete Prestipino — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 19:25:00 GMT

Mobilize.ME is slated to begin a national launch in more than 25 US cities in 2012, after a pilot program with more than 50 clients and 15,000 mobile promotions were distributed to consumers.

What may makes the service appealing (to both merchants and consumers) is that it combines deals, loyalty and feedback. Instead of focusing on one transaction in the customer relationship lifecycle, Mobilize.me used both “push and pull” incentives to capture customer attention and stimulate repeat business to drive higher value, longer lasting relationships.

“We think the future of ‘deals’ will be all about applying different forms of incentives continuously and automatically across the entire customer relationship cycle, from initial interest through advocacy,” said Byron Binkley, Mobilize.Me’s founder and CEO. “Daily deals are on a collision course with loyalty programs and socially aware customer relationship platforms like Yelp, and the outcome is going to be incentive programs that build long-term, lasting customer relationships – automatically.”