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Hopefully overtime these points will see email open and click through rates increase which will see increased traffic brought to a desired landing page.

Firstly thought must be put into why the email is being sent out. There are many reasons, some include:

• Want to engage the database or the customer base.
• Educate the database regarding a new offer.
• Traffic Generator to landing pages or social media profiles.
• Increase sales (this should be a good reason to send an email).

Get The Email Seen and Read

Sometimes emails won’t be received in a users inbox but some enhancements will see this increase. Plus, what about when they get the email?

Thought should be put into the following:

• Great subject line. This is the first identifier a user will see from a brand so this must be inviting and provide an incentive to open the email.
• Inviting personalised intro, just as a posted letter people are more likely to read an email when it’s personalised to them.
• Readable free text (not as an image), text can be seen in all email client, however images are not (see below)
• Call to action: Tell users where and what to click. Need to include areas where users should click. Need to tell them what to do unless they will delete the email.
• Slice text out of images: Create a template. A general HTML template should be built and new content dropped in for each new newsletter send.
• Add links to landing pages. If there are no links where are users going to go? Plus, all the traffic generated is lost
• What’s the plan? Why is the email being sent? An end outcome or goal should be considered.

Images Blocked

Not all email clients can by display images by default.  This is why emails need to contain a mix of free text and images. Below is an overview of email clients, ones that automatically block images and ones that require a user action to allow images to be displayed.

Subject Lines

This is the first identifier a users will see from your brand so this must be inviting and provide an incentive to open the email. There a number of things to avoid and remember when writing a subject line.

• The words: free, guarantee, spam, credit card, etc.
• ALL CAPITAL LETTERS.
• Excessive punctuation !!!, ???.Excessive user of: $%@#
• Excessive use of “click here”.
• Avoid: no “From:” address (e.g. No-reply@domain.com).
• Misleading subject lines.

Best Day To Send Emails

Everyone wants to know the best time to complete the send such as: which day, which time of the day or is the weekend better? Sends should be tested on different days with varied offers to see when the database is most receptive.

There are general rules between Tuesday and Thursday before 5pm seems to work for any industry.

Need to consider when users are likely to be at their computers, so usually at lunch breaks and towards the end of the day. But to know for sure, testing is the only way to know.

Prepare a checklist

It’s best to have a checklist so nothing is missed. Some points should include adding tracking links, checking spelling, that the right contents and images are used plus, testing which is extremely important.

Alot of small changes makes a difference, but remember it may take time to see results. Email sends should reach at least industry averages and push enough traffic to make it cost effective in the long term.

Whilst the ad network is certainly a legitimate source of traffic, they are affiliated with the correct groups and make use of a 3^rd party click monitoring software; the discrepancy left us quite confused and questioning the reliability of ad networks as a source of website traffic/visits.

As an agency we are well aware that ad clicks may not necessarily turn into visits for all the obvious reasons, however the difference normally ranges from 5% to 10%. As illustrated in the table above, the discrepancy in this case was over 30% and increasing.

Some reasons why clicks and visits do not match 100%

Google Adwords Clicks: If a visitor clicks on your ad and then gets redirected to another page, the auto-tagged parameter that identifies a visit as coming from Google Adwords gets removed from the URL.

A visitor may click your ad multiple times. When one person clicks on one advertisement multiple times in the same session, AdWords will record multiple clicks while Analytics recognizes the separate pageviews as one visit.

A visitor may click on your advertisement, but prevent the page from fully loading by navigating to another page or by pressing their browser’s Stop button. In this case, the Analytics tracking code is unable to execute and send tracking data to the Google servers. However, PPC network will still register a click.

If a visitor who clicks on your ad has either JavaScript or cookies disabled, this visitor won’t be recorded in Analytics, but the PPC network will still register a click.

These are all reasons that we clearly understand, but the large discrepancy just did not add up and made it difficult for us to meet website traffic goals for the client. Whilst all the obvious reasons for discrepancies would certainly contribute; the larger than normal variance needed more explanation. And our question remained – where did the remaining unreported clicks go?

After numerous emails and phone calls, the ad network in question discovered some publishers that were using “undesirable” techniques to drive traffic to the campaigns. This also led us to question the quality of publishers in ad networks. As an advertiser we cannot control it as closely as we can with Google Display Network, we just rely on data from the ad network

What did we learn from this?

Though ad networks are great source of clicks to a campaign, you need to assess your clients goals. In this case over 30% of ad clicks didnt even make it to the website – does this mean that your client is potentially missing out on 37% worth of sales, leads, signups, visits etc because the click never actually makes it to the website.

Always monitor actual clicks vs visits through your analytics tools. Avoid focusing on the click volume and CPC costs within the account. Always use your analytics tools to monitor website visits. Also set up conversion goals, assess quality of the traffic (time on site, bounce rate, pages per visit).

Ad networks are possibly not the best solution for our clients as we are an agency that is strongly focused on ROI and results for our clients. After seeing the major discrepancies we will probably not be going through ad networks for CPC traffic.

I can continue on with examples to make the point, but I think you most likely get the message. The convergence from just a mobile phone to a computer has been meteoric, the uptake of smartphones fuelled by Apple, HTC, Samsung  and others is having a massive impact on our lives and the way we live them, for better and for worse…

Note the below table, the year on year growth is phenomenal and the web, digital, online etc is all shifting with it.

Everything is now at your fingertips and depending on the network (no providers with will be named and shamed as part of this blog post) you have signed up to accessible from all reaches of the globe.

I like to follow tried and tested formulas so here comes some sub-headings with detail on each area.

Communication – from the humble phone you can now access all your emails (work and play). Stay in touch on whatever social media platform tickles your fancy to keep your friends, fans (& stalkers) happy, check a wide variety of documents on the fly, edit & send back.

Work – I have touched on the major positives, doesn’t matter where you are you can get your emails, access through the cloud data and make comments. The big downside is your boss, clients, customers etc. now have you 24/7. I know many people that have resisted the switch for this reason.

Importantly what does all this mean for marketers? The landscape is changing and you must shift with it. Websites must be mobile friendly – it is a no brainer but not only checking how it views on your phone but how heavy the pages are in size so it is not too slow to load.

Anyway this is just skimming over what is a big play and area. All companies need to look at this in their own business right and be ready for it.

Donkersloot, formerly General Manager of Tentacle, will be tasked with servicing existing and new WA based customers, helping to meet their needs in the areas of digital strategy, social media and search engine marketing.

Warren Barry, Managing Director, Blackglass, said: “Rob brings with him a wealth of experience in online communications and business strategy. He has years of experience working with some of the most significant online communication projects to be undertaken in both WA and the East Coast.

“With our fully integrated approach to digital strategy and marketing, we are confident he has the right range of skills to help our clients meet their strong metrics and achieve return on their investment.”

Donkersloot has developed and managed online marketing strategies for clients such as News Limited, Travellers Choice, ABN Group, Ashley & Martin and KTM Motorcycles.  He has worked with a number of organisations such as Eclipse and Patts Digital in Sydney as well as running his own online marketing consultancy. For the six years prior to joining Blackglass, he worked with Perth based online development company and digital agency, IBC / Tentacle, most recently as the organisation’s General Manager.

Further to the appointment, Blackglass, an IPMG company, has formed a strategic alliance with eBusiness Services firm, IBC Digital. The partnership will allow Blackglass to provide online marketing services to the clients of the leading WA based web development firm. IBC was previously providing online marketing services through the Tentacle brand. This strategic partnership provides IBC a significant boost in its offering and positions the group with unique online performance based marketing services severely lacking in WA.

“Rob’s appointment and the partnership with IBC come at a critical time for us, and are really a logical extension of two years of very strong growth in Australia. Our investment in industry leading tools, platforms and staff is clearly paying off,” said Barry.

But whilst the uptake in numbers is impressive (20 million) given a very short time since inception, there is nothing going on. I have coined Google+ as the new Nazca Lines, essentially interesting circles in a desert  (Wikipedia detail).  Everyday for the past fortnight I have checked in the hope of something interesting happening, at best there will be one post a day, mainly whining about the fact nothing is happening.

The interest and numbers is mostly from marketers keeping up with the latest development, but as reported by Experian the time on site has waned already purely due to no interaction. I think people have enough trouble trying to keep their current social media accounts (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIN for starters) active and Google+ isn’t a big enough change for people to start all over again.

Coming from an SEO background the + opportunity in search results means from a commercial perspective tremendous business opps, potentially as well opening up ways to tweak the system.

Time will of course tell and Google have already mooted there will be a business extension coming.

Google+ is Google’s answer to Facebook (well, the latest one anyway). Upon first glance it is very similar to Facebook with its news feed, status updates and being able to add links and images to posts. Once you get through this though a few differences can be noticed.

Circles – these are very similar to Facebook friend lists but much easier to use. Simply drag and drop your friends into the appropriate circles. This will then allow you to better target your status updates by restricting them only to those who you want to see them.

Sparks – here we see how Google is trying its hand at a similar thing to Digg or StumbleUpon by allowing the user to enter interests of theirs which then turns into a feed of popular and recent pages on the internet based around the broad (or specific) topic.

Hangouts – these are group video chat sessions you can start with up to ten people within your Circles. This is quite cool in that the Hangout can work who is talking and place their face up on the big screen while leaving the others along the bottom in smaller video windows.

+1 button – this was introduced to search engine results and websites not too long ago and now makes a lot more sense. This is the Google+ equivalent to the Facebook Like button, but pulls through to search results as well as Google’s social network.

Potential of Google+

The integration of Google+ with the other Google apps could be great. Imagine being able to have your Google Places page and your Google+ business profiles all linked, as well as Google Calendar for any events, integrating Google Reader into your Google+ feed. There are huge possibilities here.

Businesses could be able to crowd source using their Google+ profile along with apps such as Google Docs, not to mention how much better it would to be using Google Analytics for social media analytics as opposed to the rather clunky Facebook Insights.

Being able to link Google+ with Gmail would also be very handy for any private messages on the network, or even if you wanted to email a company straight from within their social profile page.

By making access to Google+ open only to those with Invites has been a very smart move on Google’s part. This has created a buzz and a want in the market for access to the network and was done very well with Gmail in the past. What better way to introduce a social network than by opening access in a viral manner?

If Google were to have access to people’s social profiles (which they currently don’t have as Facebook is largely closed off to search engines) they would be able to serve much more targeted ads on search engines, within Google+ and on their AdSense program. This potential has obviously been seen by investors with Google’s value increasing by $20 billion since the launch of Google+.

There is also potential for Google+ in that a poll conducted of Facebook users 2 out of 3 would switch to Google+.

Hurdles for Google

Getting 750 million Facebook users and 200 million Twitter users to move years and years of data over to a new network where not all of their contact may be is going to be the hardest thing for Google when trying to get this new social network to take off. Facebook have already banned Facebook ads promoting a Google+ profile and stopped apps which pull Facebook Friends Lists for importation into Google+.

Google are still to put business profiles on Google+ live, and are even removing any non-personal pages from the network until these pages are up and running.

Google are also still waiting for the iOS app for the network to be approved which is limiting mobile use, nor do they have an app which works on non-smartphones like Facebook have just released, restricting their market even more.

Facebook have already responded to Google+ by releasing video chat partnered with Skype and group chat features.

Finally, until there is a large enough number of people using the network (if they feel they can be bothered checking yet another feed) businesses have already spent countless dollars on their Facebook profiles and fan bases – will they be willing to start again on another network, while still feeding their Facebook marketing efforts?

Implications

Marketers will be able to serve more targeted online ads with this new network coupled with the advertising system Google already has set up, but with no current support for custom apps there isn’t as much room to move as there is on Facebook at the moment.

The use of Circles could be either good or bad for businesses in that people may move all the companies they are following to their own Circle in order to filter their updates out from their friends – but this could also work to a business’ advantage in that when somebody is viewing their “Company” Circle’s feed they are more receptive to their messages.

Google have also done a great job to try and keep you on their sites with the little red notifications box appearing along the top of any Google sites if you are logged in. This is a great move to pull in more of the ‘attention economy’ of the internet. There is only so much attention users can give and its value is rising constantly.

There has also been a huge increase of the incorporation of the +1 button across websites on the internet, with it now beating Twitter – this could be an indication of future adoption rates. Facebook is still winning this race though with their Like button.

An estimated 10 million people have signed up to Google+ only 2 weeks after it launching, and its not even available to the public yet. While most of these early adopters are web developers or digital marketers this is still pretty impressive – but will the general public join up as happily?

The Future

Google+ goes live to the public at the end of July with business profiles expected by the end of the year – this is when we will see if this new social network will take off or not. Google have already begun making updates including looking at integrating the network with Gmail.

What updates do Facebook have up their sleeves? They have already hit back very quickly with video chat and with Mark Zuckerburg naming that release as the beginning of a season of launches, it seems the social network war has begun.

So far, Panda was “Kung Fu-ing” the web on these dates:

Feb. 24, 2011 – Panda Update 1.0
April 11, 2011 (about 7 weeks later) – Panda Update 2.0
May 10, 2011 (about 4 weeks later) – Panda Update 2.1
June 16, 2011 (about 5 weeks later) – Panda Update 2.2

When Panda was introduced, Google announced it as a new ranking factor, one of many that Google is using, but looks like Panda works like a filter that is being rolled out every 30-60 days. Each Panda Update is addressing the issues that were missed by the previous one.

On June 21, 2011, Google has officially confirmed that Google Panda 2.2 has been rolled out.

Supposedly, one item Google was going to address with Panda 2.2 is the issue of scraper sites – websites that republish other people’s content on their own site, usually making money with affiliate links and Google AdSense ads – outranking content from original publishers.

With first Panda, many Press Release Agencies have reported a huge drop in organic traffic, and there job is to publish Press Releases that are written by the company, so they all have same content.

The last Panda addressed this issue in such a way, that only the most relevant article will be indexed in Google Results, and looks like it does work.

If we go to Yahoo and type a Title of one press release, we will see bunch of websites that have same article, same title, same Press release.

But if we type that same Title in Google, what we will get is only one website with that Title, and best of all (in our case), that is the actual website that was the first one to issue the release, the one that was paid to issue the release, others were just sharing the network of Press Release – News agencies and do copy the content from one another.

Fighting Panda Back

From my experience, Panda is not domain wide, but only decreases the value of pages with copied/poor content. So if your website has 70% of pages with copied content, and 30% original content pages, you can expect to have those 70% pages affected.

I also think if you do change the content on the pages that have been affected by Panda, which should help, ranking will not improve instantly or within 10 days, but you would need to wait for a new Panda roll-out to note these changes.

Andrija Mesterovic @ BlackGlass

Gone are the days of just calling and texting and we’re now in an era of smart phones. Phones that are no longer just a phone – it’s your camera, computer, TV, reading device, game controller, connection to your social network AND now it’s becoming your wallet: mobile wallet, enabling on-the-go transactions. It is the next big thing in digital revolution and is slowly shifting the way of we do commerce around the globe.

What is m-Commerce?

m-Commerce is the ability to conduct commerce using mobile devices, and the availability of 3G enabled mobile devices and development of built-in scanning and payment technologies are rapidly changing the way we use and interact with our mobile phones.

m-Commerce landscape

In Japan and Korea where handsets come with native bar code reader and Near Field Communication (NFC) capabilities m-Commerce has been around for a while. For the rest of the world, it is just becoming a reality with the introduction of smart phones.

In Japan:

• 3G mobile phone penetration rate is 98% of all mobile devices in the market (now they are onto 4G)
• Mobile internet shopping exceeded US$10 billion in 2009 ($1.2 billion in the US in 2009)
• 9.8 million or 10 percent of Japanese mobile subscribers used their mobile wallet to make a purchase.

At home in Australia:

• 3G phone penetration rate is currently 65% of total mobile market and is predicted to reach almost 100% by 2013.
• eCommerce giant PayPal has reported 10% of its 3.6 million active consumer accounts in Australia are using mobile payment.
• According to a report conducted by Nielsen for PayPal, Australia ranks an impressive third for m-Commerce behind Japan and Korea.

While Australia was behind in uptake of e-Commerce it looks as though we’re set for something big in m-Commerce space!

So what are the upcoming m-Commerce trends?

1: M-Ticketing:
It ranges from simply making a booking online from your PC and sending the confirmation to your phone, to purchasing tickets on a site like Moshtix mobile site, to using a ticketing app on your smart phone.

Example: Ebay StubHub iPhone app.

Ebay StubHub iPhone app brings the existing fan-to-fan online ticket marketplace to mobile space. Using this app. you can now find and buy tickets to events on-the-go and  once you found what you want it lets you share it on social network sites to see who else’s keen to go. Event ticketing just got quicker!

2: Bargain hunting / Price comparison:

The title says it all. Your mobile now lets you compare prices from different vendors and get the best deals while on the go. This is also where scanning technology really comes into play.

Example: Ebay Selling app.

Ebay Selling app features everything you need for a quick and easy sell – research functionality to find out how much your item is going for, what price you need to sell it fast, and a photo functionality to import photos instantly into your listing! If your item still has a barcode then all you have to do is to scan and let the app do the rest. And better still, share the listing on your Facebook and Twitter friends to advertise. All this and more right from your iPhone.

short video on e-bay selling app

Example: Amazon Bar Code Scanning app

A previous version of Amazon iPhone app let you search products by keyword, by recommendations or by snapping a photo of the item. Now enhanced with the new bar code scanning capability, you can simply scan the barcode of the product of interest and compare the price from Amazon listing. If the product and the price is what you are after you can buy straight from the app. No more running around for the best deal!

Example: King of the bargain hunting – Groupon

Groupon, along with other discount and group buying sites, has of course joined the queue in m-Commerce with their mobile site to offer instant bargains on mobile.

3: Financial Services: m-Banking and money transfers:

More and more financial institutions are setting up mobile sites and getting into the mobile banking, and some have gone further allowing consumers to deposit bank cheque using their phone.  Once again scanning technology is the key here.

Example: Charles Schwab Bank iPhone cheque deposit app.

This app allows you to deposit a cheque by selecting the account where they want to deposit funds. Then, you enter the deposit amount, take a photo of the front and endorsed back and hit submit. No more trips to the bank and spending your lunch hour in the queue!

Charles Schwab mobile deposit phone app

4: Location Based, Instant Deal:

By its very nature, mobile phones make for perfect tool for location based/geo-targeted offerings, and many deal sites have jumped on the bandwagon.

Example: Living Social lunch coupon

Daily deal giant, Living Social, launched $1 lunch offers in Midtown Manhattan via its new instant deals feature on its mobile app. Once you have registered to receive offers and GPS activated on your phone, you are automatically sent deals at restaurants and attractions within a half-mile radius of your location.

Example: HotelTonight

This service lets hotels send messages to guests, letting them know about events happening that night in the hotel or other special discounts. Additionally, the hotel booking app offers last-minute deals where you can book same-day stays – until 2 a.m. at major hotels in selected locations. Enabling hotels to sell inventory to the last minute while giving us consumers chance to grab real last minute deals!

5: m-Payments (incl in-app payments, mobile site, m-shopping,  m-coupon – NFC service, m-Wallet):

Like any commerce sites m-Commerce wouldn’t be complete without m-Payment features, many of which are enabled by PayPal m-Payment facility.

m-Payment/shopping Example: Starbucks – US

Starbucks Card app for iPhone and BlackBerry lets you pay for your coffee by holding up the 2-D barcode on your smartphone to the scanner at the counter. The application allows you to top up Starbucks Cards using your credit card as well as locating the nearest Starbucks.

Another m-Payment/shopping example in Korea:

The ultimate in grocery shopping using your smart phone. Use your time wisely while you wait for the train with this mobile shopping service! Simply scan a QR code of the product printed on the subway wall, click pay and done! Products will be waiting for you at home when you return.

Tesco mobile shopping while you wait for the train

m-Coupon example: McDonalds Japan

Once you are registered for the McDonalds app for iPhone and Android phone, you receive m-coupons, and it allows you to redeem your coupon by holding up the barcode on your smartphone to the scanner at the counter. The application allows you to accumulate points as well as locating the nearest McDonalds. This real time, behavioural data allows McDonalds to customise offers to individuals.

6: Mobile NFC (Near-field-communication) services:

NFC payment technology allows contactless data transfer between devices and terminals. Its use typically includes paying for transport or at shops, cash in a mobile coupon, or obtain information by touching with your phone. Phones need to be equipped with NFC technology to use this service.

Example: Paying for train (right) and drinks from vending machine (left)  in Japan.

Contactless payment example: ANZ visa card and payment terminals

In Australia ANZ Visa card has trialled the technology in the likes of 7/11 stores for payments, and next in line is Woolworths brands. While is it not via mobile it is the same technology in use.

Service station giant, Caltex, partnering up with Commbank is also set to install contactless payment terminals.

On horizon, Google is working with Citi group Master card and  it is rumoured Apple is bringing out iPhone5 with built-in NFC capability.

So what’s Next?

Now that I’ve seen and experienced m-Commerce firsthand,  I cannot think of anything more exciting than the mobile space to watch. However, adoption has been slow compared to Asia and the following key issues need to be addressed in order to accelerate the m-Commerce uptake:

• Availability of 3G enabled mobile phones, with NFC and barcode scanning capabilities
• Availability of secure payment infrastructure
• Willingness from retailers/service providers to embrace m-Commerce
• Consumer trust and education
• Optimising sites for mobile screens

While m-Commerce is still in its infancy, there is no denying it is here. With the 3G enabled phone penetration predicted to reach 100% by 2013 in Australia, and receptive attitude to the idea of mobile payments, it won’t be long before it becomes our way of life: we only need to look to leading countries like Japan and Korea to see what the future holds. So embrace it and ride the wave of mobile commerce revolution!

Still hungry for more?  Here is further info on mobile stats for you.

Due to the more prevalent nature of digital marketing, group buying websites have developed as a vital component in the online shopping business. These websites commonly display a featured deal such as a ‘deal of the day’. This will be implemented once a specific number of consumers have agreed to purchase the product or service. In order to claim their purchase, consumers print off the voucher to receive their discount at the designated retailer. The deals are established through negotiations amongst group-buying websites and local retailers. The level of discount is based around the potential increase in customers group buying can provide matched with the level of compensation the retailer can afford.

Who Owns Who?

Below is a overview of the Australian industry.

• Spreets: Yahoo7 (started by Pollenizer, also started brands Exclusive)

• Jump on it: Living Social

• Living Social: Private equity/ Amazon ($175 million)

• Our Deal: an investment channel 10

• Scoopon: $40% – $80 million investment from private investment , including James Packer

• Cudo: Channel 9

• Groupon: Private, about to go public

• Crowdmass: Star deals

Full list of group buying sites

http://www.ozbargain.com.au/wiki/list_of_group_buy_sites

Group buying by market share below.

Currently revenue and estimates for the coming year for the industry

Current Landscape

The majority of deals sold relate the three categories, they are:

• Leisure and recreation

• Food and dining

• Health and beauty

What’s Going on?

Currently there are some big stories in the industry, below are the top three from an Australian perspective.

Groupon IPO: $20 billion started in 2008

Days after daily deals site Groupon announced a $750 million initial public offering, founder and largest shareholder Eric Lefkofsky announced that the daily deals site, despite currently running at a massive loss, was going to be “wildly profitable”. Whilst Groupon sales were as high as ever last quarter reaching $644.7m, the company still have built up operating losses of $540.2m since inception in 2008. This has left many investors uninterested in holding Groupon shares.

Catch of the Day revealed that their site Scoopon is showing profits, while Deals.com.au founder Adam Schwab also came forward to say his business is profitable. Gabi Leibovich, CEO of Catch of the Day, told the Financial Review that the group is turning over $20m gross revenue. James Packer and a consortium of others investors recently made an $80 million investment into the group.

Groupon Now

Works with existing Groupon accounts and is a requirement for being able to purchase deals from the app. Once purchased, a bar code is generated that the vendor or business can scan to confirm the transaction. The service is currently only live in Chicago, but will roll out to other areas in the coming weeks and months.

To see a video on this please click on the image below follow this link

Group Buying Code of Conduct

Central to the Code is a draft list of ethical and best-practice commitments to merchants and members that participating sites should adhere to. Cudo and Spreets are inviting the industry to contribute to the content of this Code, with the aim being for a final Code to be agreed in the coming months. To view the framework follow the below link:

http://cudo.com.au/content/upload/files/CudoSpreetsCodeofConductFramework.pdf

This is a reaction to bad press from merchants and the public: they did not receive the experience they originally thought a group buying deal would offer, and mistakenly believed it would bring them extra revenue when in fact they made losses of several thousand dollars.

This has been backed by a number of industry authorities: the Australian Direct Marketing Association, the Australian Interactive Media Industry Association, the Hair and Beauty Industry Association and industry analyst Telsyte.

Selling

It is getting harder and harder for group buying companies to sell deals. Some good facts below

A group buying companies telemarketing team must achieve the following:

• 60 calls a day,

• 1 in every week and then accumulates every week

• The TV program ‘Getaway’ has a deal offer at the end of the show

• It’s getting harder to sell deals

• Increase CPL and CPA for affiliates

Differentiate Niches

As its getting very competitive in the industry companies are trying to get ahead of the rest by having a point of differentiation. Some ways this is being achieved is below.

Travel

• Living Social Escapes, national deals

• More travel deals around Australia and Thailand

Car buying

• 123cars.com.au

Groceries

• Grocery run by catch of the day, offyourtrolley.com.au,

supermarketdeals.com.au from dealsdirect

Aggregators

• Selecting deals by interest : buyii and the dealer

• Top aggregators can earn $6,000 p/m

• Commonwealth Bank, State of Origin, Virgin mobile

Redealize: Selling unused deals

Getting seen is better with another company and forming a strategic alliance, examples of this is:

Partnerships

Charity or non profit taken by group buying sites. Below is a list of where companies have assisted in building revenue, which is a good strategy as people who donate need to be members.

Charity: Love It Up

• 10% of the purchase price goes to charity

• Ebay and Living Social: http://groupdeals.ebay.com.au/

• Amazon deals: http://local.amazon.com/subscribe

The following are direct examples of group buying companies pushing charities

Spreets:

• http://spreets.com.au/deal/Sydney/other/5356/help-us-raise-money-for-sudden-infant-death-syndrome-sids-donate-10- or-more-today

SIDS: $10 deal and 287 bought

Living Social:

• http://livingsocial.com/deals/32115-5-for-10-donation-to-red-cross-relief-efforts

Living Social Red Cross: $2,162,570 was raised for the American Red Cross to aid the Japanese earthquake and tsunami victims.

• http://www.powerretail.com.au/uncategorized/livingsocial-matches-donations-for-japan-earthquake/

• http://mashable.com/2011/03/21/livingsocial-raises-2-million-japan/

Groupon:

• http://www.groupon.com/deals/lights-camera-help

• http://paidcontent.org/article/419-new-daily-deals-study-finds-red-flags-for-the-industry/

Group buying enables both the group-buying website and the associated retailer to take advantage of an increase in potential consumers through the notion of discounted offers. For the retailer this exchange aims to drive increased traffic to the store in the hope that even after this period they will remain a customer (customer acquisition and retention). For the group-buying website it enables them to expand their business affiliates in the hope to drive more traffic to their website by offering greater deals, hence advancing their impact on online shopping.

What we will be seeing in the future will be automated processes where retailers can use the whole power of group buying all by themselves. Another point will be better customer service which is being pushed by the code of conduct. How long will the industry last for? Who knows, but many consumers are enjoying the great prices and offers currently available – some just need better varieties.