Untraditional Advertising for an Advertising Genius

David and I met today to discuss our research paper outline. It was a very productive meeting in which we laid down the skeleton of our research and analysis.

One important fact we discussed today is the lack of advertising, both online and offline, Groupon engages in compared to its competitors. This goes back to our previous posts about the total failure of their Superbowl advertising campaign. Compared to one of its rival competitors - livingsocial.com, Groupon is far behind the game.

I took a deeper look into this and discovered that Groupon relies heavily on their own website as an advertising vehicle. Here are some sites that the company manages as a means of social advertising:

Groupon Facebook
Groupon Blog
Living Off Groupon Challenge

Groupon Partner, or Groupon Enemy?

This week we had a guest lecture from Vidar Hepsø of Statoil about the problems and opportunities of environmental monitoring. Some of his thoughts surrounding strategic partnerships across different layers of Statoil's stack model can be related to the Groupon, where various "partners" (and emerging competitors) add value to Groupon's business model.

This got me thinking about the disruption in the traditional advertising value chain, and how Groupon has become a player in the "implementation" of ads. Remembering a post I made last semester on "The Future of Advertising", where is the most value in this market?



The next step for this project is to define the profitability of the local advertising industry, the profitability of each layer of the stack, and the share of the profits for each firm within that layer.

Jumpstart the Tibet Fund: Groupon's Response to Its Unfavorable Super Bowl Ad

As a follow-up to David's post below regarding the public's response to Groupon's unfavorable Super Bowl ad, the company partnered with The Tibet Fund to setup a fund for the charity's Youth Employment Program. Subscribers can donate $15 to this fund via Groupon, and Groupon will match 100% of all donations. I thought this group-coupon was a great way for Groupon to publicly admit that their ad was culturally insensitive and out of line. As a result, they want to give back to the country and its people. There was definitely a need for Groupon to immediately respond to the backlash of its Super Bowl ad. What better way than engaging its subscribers to contribute to The Tibet Fund via the site. However, is this enough for the company to recover from the negative press it received following the Super Bowl?


http://www.groupon.com/deals/the-tibet-fund/

Problem Statement v1.0

All IS831 participants put together one or two slides about their topic and an initial stack analysis to think about the industry our companies compete in.

Groupon Background and First Stack Attempt

View more presentations from dweigner.

So far, we are focusing on the problem of increased competition for Groupon, not just by clones and new entrants Google and facebook, but the entire industry defined as "local advertising".

Next steps: refining the problem statement by thinking what research and data needs to be collected in the next two months, and what is the market size and importance of the various layers in our stack. We have more questions than answers right now, but that's to be expected!

Not So Super Ads for Groupon

According to Brand Bowl 2011, Groupon Super Bowl ads earned the worst sentiment score of any brand (yes, even GoDaddy). The campaign makes slightly more sense when looking at their 'save the money' site (complete with 50% off donation buttons), but for such a hot company, and one that prides itself on its (usually on point) sense of humor and corporate culture, it's a disappointment to say the least. On a positive note, Groupon were near the top in number of tweets, so at least the brand has a "conversation" going, right?

CNN Money: Groupon spends big on controversial (tasteless!?) Super Bowl spots

Judge for yourself:


**UPDATE: The video was taken down by Groupon due to the negative press

Welcome to our Project

This blog will be an outlet for our ideas and updates as we embark on a semester long independent study on Groupon and the social buying ecosystem. Because we are MS-MBA's, our study of Groupon will not be limited to marketing or traditional business strategy, but extends to how IT can disrupt a business ecosystem, how the Groupon platform can enable communities and crowdsourcing produce greater value for consumers, and what capabilities will Groupon need to acquire to compete in the next five to ten years.

Some initial questions we have been asking ourselves:

-Who are Groupon's biggests threats?

-How would using analytics to segment consumers based on demographics/buying behavior (possibly to push more relevant deals) affect the current business model?

-What features, add-on's or direction for the Groupon App could either improve/expand user experience or business model?

-Beyond raw dollar figures, what value does Groupon provide its customers and clients?

Next steps: Our first meeting with our faculty advisor, creating a stack model for the industry, and defining our problem statement.

Of course, any comments, questions or feedback are welcome. Thank you for visiting!