Coupons

The DealMap Launches, Aggregates "Deals" Atoms

~ Sebastien Provencher ~ Leave a comment

The DealMap logo

I’m late covering the launch of The Dealmap, a site that aggregates local deals from companies like Restaurant.com, Foursquare and others and enable consumers to search for them locally (and see them visually on a map).

dealmap_screenshot_front_page_nyc

Highlights from their release:

  • More than 300,000 local deals aggregated (US and UK, although I did find some in Montreal, Canada)
  • Daily deal alerts (e-mail and Twitter)
  • Gaming elements (badges, leaderboard, etc.)
  • Publicly available APIs for its unique local deal data
  • iPhone application soon to be released

The Dealmap is owned and operated by Center’d Corporation.

What it means: I like this new product because I think it illustrates perfectly the fact that every new business ecosystem creates third party opportunities. In this case, we’re starting to see a profusion of daily deals and rebate/coupon sites. Each of these daily deals is in fact a business model “atom” (read my other posts on atomization). Companies like Groupon have atomized their business models and many others are doing the same thing. Products like The DealMap aggregates these atoms to create a new way of discovering content, while spreading the original business model.

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Superpages.com to Broadcast Coupons on Twitter

~ Sebastien Provencher ~ Leave a comment

SuperMedia announced last Thursday a very interesting use of Twitter to broadcast coupons. From the release (.pdf):

Superpages.com today announced the launch of a new initiative on Twitter to drive more leads to its business listings. At no cost to the business owner, Superpages.com is distributing thousands of coupons it houses from its local business listings to 72 city-specific accounts on Twitter.

What it means: I really like this. I think this is a really neat idea to provide more visibility to Superpages.com merchants. I like the fact that they created “local” Twitter channels to make it more user relevant. That’s best practice definitely. I’m a bit disappointed that the coupons are free as I think they are leaving money on the table there. I believe coupons are perfect to monetize the real-time Web and given them away for free undermines future value. We have to assume then this is either a strategy to get merchants to claim their listings to be able to up-sell them later or a content strategy to improve user relevancy. In the context of a content strategy, I would also find third party local coupons and broadcast them in the Twitter feeds. Overall, this the beginning of a very interesting social media initiative at SuperMedia.

O'Reilly On The Killer Business Model of the Mobile World

~ Sebastien Provencher ~ 1 Comment

E-commerce is the killer app of the phone world. Anyone whose business is now based on advertising had better be prepared to link payment and fulfillment directly to search, making buying anything in the world into a one-click purchase. Real time payment from the phone is in your future.

via The Convergence of Advertising and E-commerce – O’Reilly Radar.

What it means: Tim O’Reilly posits that the future killer business model of a mobile universe is e-commerce. I agree that a mobile device is much more conducive to “action” vs. branding. This means companies that have built solid businesses on directional advertising (coupons, Yellow Pages, Google Adwords, etc.) are better positioned to monetize mobile. Business models need to evolve in the direction of actual actions or transactions though. Pay-per-call, reservations, entering a store (via check-ins?), actual sales will rule the mobile world.

O'Reilly On The Killer Business Model of the Mobile World

~ Sebastien Provencher ~ 1 Comment

E-commerce is the killer app of the phone world. Anyone whose business is now based on advertising had better be prepared to link payment and fulfillment directly to search, making buying anything in the world into a one-click purchase. Real time payment from the phone is in your future.

via The Convergence of Advertising and E-commerce – O’Reilly Radar.

What it means: Tim O’Reilly posits that the future killer business model of a mobile universe is e-commerce. I agree that a mobile device is much more conducive to “action” vs. branding. This means companies that have built solid businesses on directional advertising (coupons, Yellow Pages, Google Adwords, etc.) are better positioned to monetize mobile. Business models need to evolve in the direction of actual actions or transactions though. Pay-per-call, reservations, entering a store (via check-ins?), actual sales will rule the mobile world.

TellMeWhere: Europe's Foursquare?

~ Sebastien Provencher ~ Leave a comment

This morning, I had the chance to sit down with Gilles Barbier, CEO and co-founder of TellMeWhere (Dismoiou in French), a Paris-based European social Yellow Pages service. As with any ratings/reviews service, people can find places (see Le Louvre profile page for example), read the basic information, see the map and pictures, rate/comment on the place, see what others have said and discover related places. So far, although well executed, it’s not very different feature-wise than a lot of ratings/reviews sites like Yelp or Qype.

Mobile as a differentiator

Where it gets really interesting is with their iPhone application (they also have an Android one). The beautifully designed (both from a user interface and user experience) app is where the rubber really hit the road for the young startup founded three years ago. Launched in July, the mobile version has been downloaded more than 400,000 times (on a total of 2 million iPhones in France).

TellMeWhere iPhone Application Home

Features include:

  • Location-based business search
  • Ability to rate/comment places and broadcast your comment on Twitter/Facebook
  • See feedback from other users and your friends
  • See recommendations based on your tastes
  • Great integration of Facebook Connect with instant account creation based on your Facebook information
  • Push of your activities to your friends’ phone and possibility for your friends to answer you back via SMS
  • Integration with Google Maps
  • Integration with the iPhone camera allowing users to take a picture and upload it right away to the place profile page

TellMeWhere iPhone Application recommendations

The release of their iPhone application has created a lot of user traction. Barbier asked me to pick a small town in France just to prove the breadth of usage. I chose Venasque, a small 1000-inhabitant village in Provence where I stayed last spring. I think there are only a dozen businesses in the village. TellMeWhere had two votes in their system. They even had a few activities in smaller towns in Canada. And now they’re on the verge of releasing version 2.0 of their mobile application of the iPhone and it will include check-in functionality (like Foursquare) and an activity stream of everything your friends are doing to enable real-time discovery. You can see a video of the new application here.

TellMeWhere iPhone Application Place Profile

Barbier shared with me that they’ve now realized their mobile applications (built in-house) have become strategic for the small 7-employee company. The combination of mobile + local + social (utilizing an existing identity system like Facebook Connect) is a winning formula.

Mobile will be disruptive

And this is where, in the future of local search, mobile wins (as opposed to the Web). I finally see the light and now realizes that mobile will probably be the great disruptor it was always supposed to be. Why? Because, as Barbier said, mobile usage is real. It’s grounded in real life, with your day-to-day local usage and your social graph. That’s how you build usage. In web-based local search, it’s all about search engine optimization (SEO) these days as it’s very expensive to build new brands. It’s traffic coming from Google and other search engines from users with little loyalty. And with the Mountain View goliath hosting more and more content on their own site, I suspect that strategy will soon go off its rails.

Real-time business model

As for TellMeWhere’s business model, they’re monetizing using “special offers”. Merchants can claim their listing and submit deals/coupons/special offers (the best way to monetize real-time local as I’ve often said). It’s a pay-per-action model (or as Barbier coined it “pay-per-visit) where merchants only pay when the user displays the coupon on their phone on location. With geo-location, it’s easy to verify if the user was really on premise or not when he displayed the coupon. Barbier told me he can charge 4 euros to restaurants each time someone uses a coupon. Sounds like a good model.

I think TellMeWhere has everything to become Europe’s Foursquare. The application is beautifully executed and is easy to use. Current usage seems to show a very positive trend. They have traction in France and other francophone countries and want to go after the rest of Europe and the English-speaking world. You should definitely check out their iPhone application if you want to see a great social/local mobile app.

Update: Gilles Barbier tells me version 2.0 of his application has been approved by Apple and is now available for download.

TellMeWhere: Europe's Foursquare?

~ Sebastien Provencher ~ Leave a comment

This morning, I had the chance to sit down with Gilles Barbier, CEO and co-founder of TellMeWhere (Dismoiou in French), a Paris-based European social Yellow Pages service. As with any ratings/reviews service, people can find places (see Le Louvre profile page for example), read the basic information, see the map and pictures, rate/comment on the place, see what others have said and discover related places. So far, although well executed, it’s not very different feature-wise than a lot of ratings/reviews sites like Yelp or Qype.

Mobile as a differentiator

Where it gets really interesting is with their iPhone application (they also have an Android one). The beautifully designed (both from a user interface and user experience) app is where the rubber really hit the road for the young startup founded three years ago. Launched in July, the mobile version has been downloaded more than 400,000 times (on a total of 2 million iPhones in France).

TellMeWhere iPhone Application Home

Features include:

  • Location-based business search
  • Ability to rate/comment places and broadcast your comment on Twitter/Facebook
  • See feedback from other users and your friends
  • See recommendations based on your tastes
  • Great integration of Facebook Connect with instant account creation based on your Facebook information
  • Push of your activities to your friends’ phone and possibility for your friends to answer you back via SMS
  • Integration with Google Maps
  • Integration with the iPhone camera allowing users to take a picture and upload it right away to the place profile page

TellMeWhere iPhone Application recommendations

The release of their iPhone application has created a lot of user traction. Barbier asked me to pick a small town in France just to prove the breadth of usage. I chose Venasque, a small 1000-inhabitant village in Provence where I stayed last spring. I think there are only a dozen businesses in the village. TellMeWhere had two votes in their system. They even had a few activities in smaller towns in Canada. And now they’re on the verge of releasing version 2.0 of their mobile application of the iPhone and it will include check-in functionality (like Foursquare) and an activity stream of everything your friends are doing to enable real-time discovery. You can see a video of the new application here.

TellMeWhere iPhone Application Place Profile

Barbier shared with me that they’ve now realized their mobile applications (built in-house) have become strategic for the small 7-employee company. The combination of mobile + local + social (utilizing an existing identity system like Facebook Connect) is a winning formula.

Mobile will be disruptive

And this is where, in the future of local search, mobile wins (as opposed to the Web). I finally see the light and now realizes that mobile will probably be the great disruptor it was always supposed to be. Why? Because, as Barbier said, mobile usage is real. It’s grounded in real life, with your day-to-day local usage and your social graph. That’s how you build usage. In web-based local search, it’s all about search engine optimization (SEO) these days as it’s very expensive to build new brands. It’s traffic coming from Google and other search engines from users with little loyalty. And with the Mountain View goliath hosting more and more content on their own site, I suspect that strategy will soon go off its rails.

Real-time business model

As for TellMeWhere’s business model, they’re monetizing using “special offers”. Merchants can claim their listing and submit deals/coupons/special offers (the best way to monetize real-time local as I’ve often said). It’s a pay-per-action model (or as Barbier coined it “pay-per-visit) where merchants only pay when the user displays the coupon on their phone on location. With geo-location, it’s easy to verify if the user was really on premise or not when he displayed the coupon. Barbier told me he can charge 4 euros to restaurants each time someone uses a coupon. Sounds like a good model.

I think TellMeWhere has everything to become Europe’s Foursquare. The application is beautifully executed and is easy to use. Current usage seems to show a very positive trend. They have traction in France and other francophone countries and want to go after the rest of Europe and the English-speaking world. You should definitely check out their iPhone application if you want to see a great social/local mobile app.

Update: Gilles Barbier tells me version 2.0 of his application has been approved by Apple and is now available for download.

Twitter's Future According to Loic Le Meur

~ Sebastien Provencher ~ 3 Comments

Loic Le Meur takes a stab at predicting Twitter’s future and lists 30 predictions on his blog. Here are some related to local media:

  • “It will reach masses of people”. Reaching masses of people means “mass media” but with a strong local tangent.
  • “Status updates will be open across social software. All social software will have status updates”. I make the same claim in the “perfect local media company” presentation I’m doing at the Local Social Summit tomorrow.
  • “We will laugh thinking we were updating them all manually. Location will be one of the most widespread status update”. From a local point of view, expect mobile devices to ping Twitter with our permission.
  • “Live reviews of any place and product will deeply influence it though”. Ah! Couldn’t agree more. This is the biggest opportunity and threat for traditional local media.
  • “Promos by brands and retailers will have big success for last minute deals”. This will be the core monetization model of real-time conversations and search for local media. Newspapers & coupon companies are already well positioned for this kind of product. Directory publishers not so much.
  • “Talking to shops and restaurants via Twitter will become standard and will get opt in coupons as we enter a shop, based on location”. This is the natural evolution for small businesses. First they will listen, then they will engage and offer promos.
  • “Hyperlocal news sites with Twitter geotagging feature”. Obviously, Twitter will be a powerful broadcast mechanism for local news.
  • “Google will have its own Twitter and won’t acquire Twitter”. This means traditional media publishers will have to contend with two (three if you count Facebook) major worldwide competitors (or coopetitors depending how you see the world).

Le Meur is also the organizer of the LeWeb conference happening in Paris in December. I will be attending the conference as an invited blogger.

Twitter's Future According to Loic Le Meur

~ Sebastien Provencher ~ 3 Comments

Loic Le Meur takes a stab at predicting Twitter’s future and lists 30 predictions on his blog. Here are some related to local media:

  • “It will reach masses of people”. Reaching masses of people means “mass media” but with a strong local tangent.
  • “Status updates will be open across social software. All social software will have status updates”. I make the same claim in the “perfect local media company” presentation I’m doing at the Local Social Summit tomorrow.
  • “We will laugh thinking we were updating them all manually. Location will be one of the most widespread status update”. From a local point of view, expect mobile devices to ping Twitter with our permission.
  • “Live reviews of any place and product will deeply influence it though”. Ah! Couldn’t agree more. This is the biggest opportunity and threat for traditional local media.
  • “Promos by brands and retailers will have big success for last minute deals”. This will be the core monetization model of real-time conversations and search for local media. Newspapers & coupon companies are already well positioned for this kind of product. Directory publishers not so much.
  • “Talking to shops and restaurants via Twitter will become standard and will get opt in coupons as we enter a shop, based on location”. This is the natural evolution for small businesses. First they will listen, then they will engage and offer promos.
  • “Hyperlocal news sites with Twitter geotagging feature”. Obviously, Twitter will be a powerful broadcast mechanism for local news.
  • “Google will have its own Twitter and won’t acquire Twitter”. This means traditional media publishers will have to contend with two (three if you count Facebook) major worldwide competitors (or coopetitors depending how you see the world).

Le Meur is also the organizer of the LeWeb conference happening in Paris in December. I will be attending the conference as an invited blogger.

Google Coupon Search is Now Live

~ Sebastien Provencher ~ Leave a comment

My friend Eric just sent me an IM to warn me that Google has now launched their coupon search functionality in Google Maps (via Mike Blumenthal’s blog). Some examples:

Google Maps Coupons Toronto

The search function is still buried but this might be the prelude of better exposure for that specific Google product. The Inside Google blog had recently discovered a bunch of coupon-related domain names registered to Google’s name.

What it means: coupons are a great way to track the efficiency of a local ad product as it brings clear traceability to the whole purchase process. Given their strong desire to track advertising ROI, I’m not surprised Google is interested in promoting this feature.