Social Media Examiner's 2012 Social Media Report was released a few days ago, and I was finally able to sit down and digest it. There were a lot of interesting results that I will be happy to talk about at another time, but one thing in particular jumped out at me and has me thinking.
It has to do with the result below:
Daily deals were all the rage a couple of years ago for consumers, and in many ways, they're still a hot item. The main contenders in the beginning were Groupon and Living Social, but now every newspaper, radio station, and start up company has them. Before, daily deals were limited primarily to restaurants, beauty services, teeth whitening, and auto details. Today, you can get amazing deals on travel, excursions, and big ticket items. If you have signed up to receive these alerts from the big guys, plus all the local companies offering them, no doubt you wake up in the morning with the arduous task of clearing out your inbox.
And do you know what's happening? People are starting to tune them out.
I'm in no way implying that daily deals will be gone by the end of 2012, but if 72% of marketers have no plans on using daily deals, it can't be a good sign—especially for the smaller, home-grown options. I'm also struck by the issues that Groupon is currently experiencing. It seems they just can't get a handle on being a public company. They've gone from being a media darling to being in the hot seat in a manner of months. Personally, I think Google is breathing a 6 billion dollar sigh of relief that their offer to buy Groupon wasn't accepted last year.
Yes, the results indicated that 2% more of marketers plan on using daily deals in their marketing efforts than in 2011, but 27% still pales in comparison to the 72% that have NO intention of using it (If you're curious as to who makes up that 72%, the vast majority of marketers who answered the survey were in companies that had 2 - 10 employees.). If these marketers aren't using daily deal sites, then who's going to keep them alive? Think about it, how often do you see a major brand like Pepsi or Krispy Kreme using daily deals?
My question to you is this: Have you used daily deals in the past, and do you expect to use them this year? Why or why not?
