Groupon crazy

Tony Shelton

Tony Shelton

BS Detector, Esquire
Right now Shelly is groupon crazy. On my desk I have round of golf, movie tickets, massages and who knows what else piling up. I don't know when there will ever be the time to redeem them, but apparently the deals were too good to pass up so they end up on my desk.

I can't see how this would work in commercial work, but is groupon working for any of you guys?
 
If things are slow and you want to get a chance to impress alot of new clients then you can make it work. Its turned into some good upsells and repeat customers. Its not going to make you rich though.
 
I looked into this once. They want you to discount your services by at least 50%. Basically here is the break down......

$300 normal driveway cleaning.
Take 50% off of that equals $150 driveway cleaning special on Groupon.
Groupon takes 50% of the $150 so now you get $75 for that $300 driveway cleaning.

If I am wrong on my figures, please feel free to correct me.
 
apple said:
Thats right Vince. Its just not set up to work for a service company like ours. Especially not one who only sees the customers once every few years.

Now I bet it works great for restaurants, stores and places like that.
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I agree
 
I looked into Groupon last year. The girl I spoke to suggested a $99 house wash because some guy in my area did it and sold 300 house washes. Turns out it was a painter BTW.

I explained to her, after giving Groupon $49.50, $8 in chems, $5 in gas for PW and an avg of $20 for truck gas, I wouldn't make min wage.

I think the painter went out of business.....Darwin Award nominee
 
They only way I see it of actually working is if you could upsell every customer you get. Then it might be worth. Might is the keyword here.
 
Vince Wood said:
They only way I see it of actually working is if you could upsell every customer you get. Then it might be worth. Might is the keyword here.
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Problem is that the typical Groupon buyer is after deals.....buying on price not need. Low upsell potential.
 
I would think it is only going to work for contract work. If it's not a repeatable service, you will just give someone a great discount to never see them again. The companies that use Groupon the most and succeed are baiting new repeat customers. It would have to tie in to some good customer service to be most effective.
 
A semi local company here is doing a GROUPON for 90$ for 1800 Sq. Foot house wash......... So even if they haggled good with groupon and are taking 75% cut thats still under 70$ a house pre expenses. Don't know how they are profitable on this..... They have sold over 500 though so I suppose its atleast keeping their crews busy during the winter months.
 
I think there is one thing that was left out of this thread. Once you land the customer from the Groupon that client is forever in your database. So they only receive the discount that one cleaning and from then on you have the client for the life of your company.

I feel like that alone may justify the ridiculous discount. Essentially, like breaking even to get a client for life. I guess its all perspective, if you are trying to make money now or down the road. But I still think I would like to try Groupon.
 
AZ PowerWash Pros said:
I think there is one thing that was left out of this thread. Once you land the customer from the Groupon that client is forever in your database. So they only receive the discount that one cleaning and from then on you have the client for the life of your company.

I feel like that alone may justify the ridiculous discount. Essentially, like breaking even to get a client for life. I guess its all perspective, if you are trying to make money now or down the road. But I still think I would like to try Groupon.
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There is a stereotype that most GROUPON customers are deal/price shoppers, are they the type of client your going to be able to sell a near retail wash down the road due to valuing YOU after the wash or are they going to go deal shopping again?
 
I think that it is possible those stereotypes are easier to sell in the future. If they are the people that fit that stereotype then they are easily subjective to mass marketing techniques. Save 20%, huge sale! Etc...

And if I email them every three months my services will be stuck in their mind like the Groupon marketing they were susceptible to. But that is assuming they are cheap. And I don't think they are. I think they are just people looking for deals like all of us.

Regardless, I think the issue is more that Groupon is taking too much money. Because these people are spending more money then what you are receiving. Based on Vince's math the homeowner is paying $150. And although that is cheap it does not prove to me that these people are too cheap to pay $225 next year. I think without Groupon gouge there would be no issues so it might be worth picking up the business for the long haul.

As long as they have money to spend and are in my service location they fall into my marketing demographic.
Haha all perspective though!

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