I just realized I never posted the results of the Groupon "side deal" they ran for us in late October. I can tell you we were dissapointed with how many of them we sold (40). But, since we only paid based on the amount that were sold - it was still the best money I've spent on advertising BY FAR. And, "by far" isn't an extreme enough term. The people that bought our Groupon were, for the most part, serious about trying out our pet food and service. 74 percent of the ones that have been redeemed so far have continued with the service after their Groupon was used. On a cost-per-customer basis, nothing I've ever done has come close.
However, from Groupon's perspective, they didn't make nearly as much money off of us as they usually do. I knew our chances were slim that they would run us again (why would they want to make a few hundred from us when they can make several thousand if they run a different business). So, I told my rep. that we would be available on short notice if they ever got a last minute cancellation. My strategy has paid off. They needed a business to be featured on Christmas Day and I volunteered. I'm sure Christmas will be the worst possible day to be a feature, but it is better than nothing!
Just to put the 40 Groupons that we sold in perspective. The other day, they had a Groupon in our market (Louisville) for $18 worth of gourmet cupcakes for $9. They sold 3,705 of them! That's just in Louisville. Groupon will keep half the revenue generated - or $16,673. Since they had already featured that cupcake company before, they didn't even have to create any new graphics. All they had to do was hit the "send" button to their e-mail list (perhaps a slight oversimplification, but you get the idea).
Groupon has really hit on something. They recently turned down a purchase offer from Google for $6 Billion.
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