Skip to main content

Daily deal sites Groupon, LivingSocial lose steam in August

Groupon wins
Image used with permission by copyright holder

According to CouponHQ, Both Groupon and LivingSocial lost a bit of revenue over the month of August. Laying blame at Hurricane Irene for the decrease in purchases and number of deals, Groupon fell by 4.8 percent and LivingSocial by 1.8 percent. However, revenue also declined for the companies in July. While Groupon’s average cost of a deal has risen over August, the number of Groupon vouchers sold is down by 14 percent. The average cost of a deal rose from about $40 in March to nearly $60 and the average price per voucher sold rose from about $20 to nearly $30. Groupon’s more expensive deals were travel related which also comprised 33 percent of the top grossing deals for the company in August.

According to the study, LivingSocial’s revenue has been bolstered by its partnership with Fandango in both March and June of this year. The promotion offered up two movie tickets for $9 for the same film and it ending up grossing about $9 million for the company. The amount of unique visitors to both companies fell in August again from a peak in June 2011. However, CouponHQ is waiting for the September figures to see if the trend continues in deals offered and purchased as well as overall traffic.

Groupon has also decided to slow down plans for an IPO based off a story in the Wall Street Journal today. The company cancelled plans for an investor roadshow that was supposed to kick off after Labor Day and is making the decision to wait for a more stable stock market before continuing plans to go public. Groupon has attracted criticism in releasing financial information due to a strange accounting inclusion that drew the attention of the Securities and Exchange Commission. Analysts are also concerned about the increasingly overwhelming marketing costs as well as the lack of a path to profitability due to increased competition.

Mike Flacy
By day, I'm the content and social media manager for High-Def Digest, Steve's Digicams and The CheckOut on Ben's Bargains…
The 5 best websites like Craigslist in 2024

For years, Craigslist has been the go-to website for scoring a free sofa or finding an apartment. But there are plenty of other alternatives to Craigslist that do an equally fine job, oftentimes with a more attractive interface and fewer spam postings. The 5 best Craigslist alternatives are:

Facebook Marketplace
OfferUp
Locanto
Mercari
Recycler

Read more
How to stop spam emails in Outlook, Gmail, and more
A person sitting on the grass and taking notes at a laptop.

Spam and other unwanted emails are a nuisance, and it can seem like keeping them away from your inbox is a losing battle. But while you won't be able to prevent every piece of spam from landing in your inbox, it is possible to significantly reduce the number of messages that show up.

In this guide, we'll show you how to use filters, blocking, and spam reporting features to help stop spam from invading your inbox. We'll also go over a few more tips on how to reduce unwanted messages overall.
How to stop spam in Gmail
If you use Gmail, the most popular email client, you will eventually start getting spam. Here are our two favorite ways to deal with it.
Block spam in Gmail

Read more
How to add a signature in Gmail on desktop and mobile
how to file for stimulus

Email signatures are a great way to automatically include your contact information to your email correspondence. If you'd like to add a signature to your emails in Gmail, it's easy enough to add one. You'll just need to go through your Gmail settings to do it.

In this guide, we'll show you how to add a signature in Gmail whether you're using the desktop website version of Gmail or its mobile app.
How to add a signature on your desktop
Step 1: Launch your favorite browser and log into your Gmail account as you normally would.

Read more