growing with groupon

Groupon is a great way to introduce your business to new customers.  Many business owners believe there is an advantage to using Groupon vs traditional advertising because with Groupon (for most deals) you only pay when someone makes a purchase.  Many business owners don't even feel like they're PAYING Groupon since the customer pays Groupon and then Groupon pays you.  But, don't be misled, Groupon is expensive.  (While I acknowledge every deal is different, I'm going to use a basic deal that one of my clients recently did through Groupon).  

A restaurant looking to bring in new customers might make a special offer on Groupon.  Maybe you offer "Buy Two Pizzas for $11".  Normally you would sell two pizzas for $22.  So you're essentially offering "buy one, get one free". However, Groupon collects the $11 and pays you $5.50. So now you're selling two pizzas for $5.50.  

The downside to this deal is, you may have done better if you offered "Buy two pizzas for $8" through your own social media. The customer would be happier since the pizza is cheaper and you would have gotten $8 instead of $5.50.  However, if you don't have a huge following on social media, you don't have the option of "Do-it-Yourself".  Another problem is, over 80% of customers who take advantage of a Groupon offer, don't ever come back to your restaurant to make a purchase at full price.  It can take quite a few visits to get a person to become a regular at your retail shop or restaurant.  

So How Can I Make Groupon Work for Me?

To get the most out of Groupon (and similar services), you should use it as to gather leads.  Using our pizza example, if you lose $5 on every pizza deal, you have basically spent $5 to get a lead.  Now you need to turn that lead into a lifelong customer. 

If you want Groupon to work for you, you need a plan BEFORE you make your Groupon offer.  The best, easiest and least expensive way to make Groupon work is to collect the cellphone numbers of your Groupon purchasers for a Text Marketing (SMS) Campaign. 


 (Contact us to get special discount offers on text marketing and mobile web apps with texting capabilities).

Once people purchase your Groupon offer, give them the opportunity to save even more, or to get a free gift by subscribing to your text campaign.  You know they are interested in your product or service because they've already purchased on Groupon. You know they are looking for value.  You can offer them "Exclusive Savings".  If you manage the campaign properly, most of the Groupon purchasers will sign up to receive your text messages.  This allows you to increase the value of every campaign that you run on Groupon.  Suppose you get 25 responses to your Groupon campaign every time you run an offer.  You can quickly build a subscriber list and turn those one time bargain hunters into lifelong customers. 


If you have questions about how this strategy can help your business, please fill out the form to the right and submit your questions or call 973-220-6859.  There is no charge and no obligation.