Daily deal websites are quickly becoming an essential marketing tool. Each day these sites send out deals to millions of bargain-hungry subscribers. Now there’s evidence of a real payoff for restaurants that participate: A recent Technomic survey found that 48 percent of deal buyers used coupons at restaurants they’d never visited. What’s more, 67 percent of those customers returned to the same restaurant later without the incentive of a deal. Here are a few deal programs to give you a lay of the land.
| The Heavyweights ... The Newbies ... The Locals | |||||
| Daily Deal site | Deal distribution channels | Commission rate | Customer reach | Best features | Drawbacks |
| Yelp Deals | Featured on business’s Yelp page; mobile apps; shared on social media | No upfront costs; 30% of discounted price for each deal purchased | 50 million monthly to Yelp.com | Ideal for reaching U.S. local markets; heavy traffic from restaurant customers | Deals aren’t sent directly to potential customers; Yelp scaling on deals |
| Groupon | Groupon.com; daily email; mobile apps; shared on social media | No upfront costs; fee subtracted from total quantity of units sold | 115 million subscribers | Highest volume of users, very established deal provider | Rejects some businesses; rate may be high for small businesses |
| Living Social | Livingsocial.com, daily email; mobile apps; shared on social media | No upfront costs; commission negotiable; payment due after promotion | 30 million subscribers | Instant Deal engages in real time via app; buy-three-get-one-free incentive | Rejects some businesses; rate may be high for small businesses |
| Restaurant.com | Restaurant.com; daily email; social media | No cost to participate | 3.5 million subscribers | Tailored marketing services; specializes in restaurants | No online registration; relatively few subscribers. |
| Scoutmob | Scoutmob.com; daily email; mobile app; social media | No upfront costs; charged at point of offer redemption | Not available | High number of deal offers are claimed by buyers | Only serves 13 major cities; no pre-payment of purchased vouchers |
| Google Offers Beta | Google.com/offers; daily email; plans for more distribution channels | No upfront costs; percentage of revenues shared not publicly available | Not available | High visibility; in some cases merchants paid for sold but unused vouchers | Currently only available in eight cities |
| Bloomspot | Bloomspot.com; daily emails; shared on social media | Guarantees profitability; commission rate not publicly available. | Over 1 million subscribers | Targets the affluent; provides incentive to spend over voucher amount | Currently only serves 11 cities; focuses primarily on high-end restaurants |
| NY Daily News | Featured on NY Daily News daily deals page; shared on social media | No upfront costs; commission rate not publicly available | Not available | Advertising in widely-read news source | Customer reach limited to New York metro area |
| The Washington Post Capitol Deal | The Washington Post, Express, Washingtonpost.com, thecapitoldeal.com | No upfront costs; commission rate not publicly available | Not available | Advertising in widely-read news source | Customer reach limited to Washington D.C. metro area |
| Conejo Deals | Conejodeals.com; daily email; shared on social media | No upfront costs; most commissions are typically around 50% but are negotiated on a case-by-case basis | 17,000 subscribers to daily email, 90% are local | Ideal for reaching local subscribers (subscribers to daily emails live and work near featured businesses); for every deal, $1 is sent to local charitable organizations and schools | Customer reach limited to California’s Conejo Valley (LA’s largest suburb) and surrounding communities |
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