Is a Groupon promotion really a great marketing strategy for your company?

So many companies are flocking to Groupon and other group buying discount websites, thinking that they are the be all and end all of promotion. It’s a proven fact that these sites can send quite a large quantity of customers to your establishment but its also a well known fact that you’re going to lose a lot of money in order to do that. I was talking to a restaurant owner earlier this week that had recently offered $30 in meals for $15 on a local group buying site. Out of the $15 collected, they will receive $6.80 per purchase. The site did manage to sell 268 coupons in two days meaning this particular restaurant will be offering potential customers $8,040 in meals for $1,822.40 in revenue. Continue reading “Is a Groupon promotion really a great marketing strategy for your company?”

How Groupon and Facebook can help you launch your new business

As a former manager in the newspaper business, I know the struggles that the industry is currently facing with increased costs and decreased subscriptions and readership. Once upon a time the best way to promote your new business was to take out a series of advertisements in your local newspaper. They had the readership levels required to get people in the door and making it one of the best ways to market your business. While newspaper advertising still has value to their customers and those reading it, there are better options to launch your new business and build a loyal following amongst your new customers at little to no cost to yourself.
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Is Groupon really worth $25 billion dollars? Really?

I’ve been on a bit of a Groupon kick lately because of all the attention it has been receiving not only in the media but also by the various competitors that are taking aim at it. On the competition side you have a huge group that includes some well-known names such as Living Social. Both Facebook and Google, two juggernauts with massive financial clout, are looking at offering similar group buying deals to their users. Despite the competition the company is hoping to go public with a massive $25 billion dollar IPO sometime this year.
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Introducing Groupon’s newest and toughest challenger to date – Facebook

Industry leader Groupon may end up regretting not taking up Google on its takeover offer. Not only does the company have many competing group buying websites operating or planned, both on national and local scales, Facebook has set up their teaser page for their offering Facebook Deals.
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Why are so many people jumping on the Groupon business model bandwagon?

Image: nuchylee / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I subscribe to a number of news alerts through Google and it seems that I am constantly reading articles about a brand new company that is trying to emulate Groupon’s business model of offering limited time, discounted deals to local customers. Groupon has become a major success story as they tested their business model in Chicago and then expanded into other major cities in the US and Canada. Now the company has sales representatives operating in over 250 markets in North America, South America, Asia and Europe.
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