Know your Deals – Groupon and other group buying sites

That I’m a spontaneous buyer is true. Whether I’m shopping for shoes, clothes or even food I’d buy impulsively whatever I see is on sale! 🙁 Most often than not I regret some of them. With the emergence of Groupon, DailyDeal and similar promos – deal-of-the-day or group buying websites that feature discounted gift certificates usable at local or national companies, my spontaneity wasn’t spared. I’m hooked.

I’ve had so far spent for facials, an iLipo session, fresh fish buys, photobooks, food and bubbleteas, shoes and jackets, a fitness-studio session and a photo session. I’ve yet to buy a travel deal – they got it really low. I’d also want to have a me-time at a spa or have a massage or a wellness treat at a thermal hotel.

   

Groupon  is from the name blends – “group” and “coupon” –  before, I don’t really know how it works but thanks to wiki’s detailed explanation…I just buy knowing I’m getting discounts.

The company offers one “Groupon” (“group coupon”) per day in each of the markets it serves. The Groupon works as an assurance contract using ThePoint’s platform: if a certain number of people sign up for the offer, then the deal becomes available to all;[18] if the predetermined minimum is not met, no one gets the deal that day. This reduces risk for retailers, who can treat the coupons as quantity discounts as well as sales promotion tools. Groupon makes money by keeping approximately half the money the customer pays for the coupon. So, for example, an $80 massage could be purchased by the consumer for $40 and then Groupon and the retailer would split the $40. That is, the retailer gives a massage valued at $80 and gets approximately $20 from Groupon for it. And the consumer gets the massage, in this example, from the retailer for which they have paid $40 to Groupon.

It is also good to know that there are certain businesses to which Groupon will not offer its services. Click here to know what those are.

Groupon is of course not without flaws. I remember reading some complaints of customers about establishments not honoring their vouchers and I experienced that too. Fortunately, it’s not them but the other one, DailyDeal who has a bad customer service (they won’t reply on your emails) and they’d often get services from uncooperative merchants. I’ve written many times about them in the negative but still, they just turn a blind eye on the issues…

I like Groupon’s service because they are accommodating and they have the best offers from the many sites I’ve signed up with.

Some words of caution, make sure that what you buy will be used as I ended up buying some that I wasn’t able to redeem. Of course, no business will give you really anything for less or free!

Read the details of the deal you’re interested with thoroughly. For example you’re getting a 20€ off a shop for items with prices of 40€…What if the prices at the shop is at the 60€ minimum? You can’t maximize the value of that deal because you’ll end up adding some more. So do the math and be wary!

Use your coupon immediately or at least make an appointment earlier on. If there are 1000 people who bought a groupon deal and the reservations say, is until a month only, you have to hurry up! Otherwise, your spot might not be given anymore.

Choose the best deal-of-the-day website so you don’t get exposed to a lot – you’ll surely limit yourself from buying deals that would be left unusable later on.

If you wanna save up, ask your friends to sign up under you as an affiliate, I forgot how much you get but it’s surely worth it to save up and have a buddy go with you the next time you want to eat a pizza or have a relaxing massage.