LoveOneDaySales.co.nz? Yes We Do!

Buyer Beware: Advice For Daily Deal Buyers to Ensure Your Daily Deal Makes Your Day

Sheldon Nesdale — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 22:34:54 +0000

The Commerce Commission has just reported that the number of complaints they receive about Daily Deal sites has gone done from 22.5 per month in early 2011 to 10 per month near the end of the year.

I have also noticed a decrease in complaints posted to www.LoveOneDaySales.co.nz.

No-one wants a deal to go bad. Here's 5 things you can do to ensure your daily deal makes your day (rather than turning it into a bad day):

Read the whole deal (not just the headline and price), including the small print and conditions. Unpleasant surprises after purchase include:

Freight is $50 when you were expecting $5!
Delivery time is 3 weeks when you were expecting overnight!
Your restaurant voucher is not valid on the weekends!

If it's a product, check the retail price at other online stores

Is the daily deal site inflating the normal retail price to make their deals look better?

Be aware of the psychological techniques they are using to get you to buy:

A countdown timer and stock level meter to create a sense of scarcity and immediacy
Huge discount percentage created by the discounted price and an inflated normal retail price

Look for a discussion about the deal (either on the deal site itself, or on their Facebook page), read those comments first

Others might have spotted a potential problem that you might of missed

If you purchased an experience, make your booking immediately (the same day, or, even better, within an hour)

You'll beat the rush and you'll get a time that suits you
You'll minimise the chance of forgetting and wasting the voucher when it expires

What Can You Do When The Deal Goes Bad?

Locate their customer support system on their website
- Usually this is an email form
- or a "support ticket" system
- or sometimes just an email address
- If you are really lucky they'll be a phone number (this is rare)
Describe your problem and ensure you include any reference numbers, receipt numbers, date and time etc so it's easy for them to find your purchase
Include what you want to happen next Eg a replacement? a different item? a refund?
Include your expectation of when you would like a result Eg "Please provide a replacement product by Friday the 20th of Jan"
If you don't hear from them, or the date you set for them passes, fill in the contact form again
If that doesn't work, let me know via this website and I'll see what I can do
You can also contact the Commerce Commission and make a formal complaint

What Else?

What advice do you have to other consumers?

What has caught you out in the past?

Tell your story in the comments below.

Todays Changes To The Lists of Daily Deal Websites (3 Oct 2011)

Sheldon Nesdale — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 06:54:09 +0000

Removed GameADay.co.nz entirely. Deals are not often enough
Moved DealaDay.co.nz from the "Single" deal a day list to the "Many" deal a day list because there are always 3 deals
Moved the "Many" deals a day category above "Single" deal a day because of popularity
Created new category "Books" and moved 3 deal sites there
Several website moved to the "Dropped" list because their deals are not frequent enough

Pop-Up Windows Demanding Your Email Address Are Awesome

Sheldon Nesdale — Fri, 02 Sep 2011 02:08:15 +0000

When you visit a new Daily Deal website for the first time, which of the following do you like to see first?

Would you like to see the deals they have on today?
Would you like to read their "About Us" page and look for clues like a physical address that will let you know that you can trust this business with your email address and/or credit card details?
or do you just prefer to get a pop-up window in your face demanding your email address?

You probably didn't choose Option #3, am I right?

Why do so many Daily Deal sites (especially those in the Experiences category) shove a pop-up window in your face demanding your email address?

The obvious answer is that they want your email address.

In the Daily Deal game, having a huge list of email addresses is as good as gold bars in a bank. With it, they have permission to tempt you with deals every day, and they might be able to decrease the amount they spend on mass media advertising on TV/Newspapers/Radio if their list is big enough.

Is it too early to demand your email address when you only heard about this daily deal website 10 seconds ago? And you are visiting their website for the very first time?

Yes, I think so.

You don't know them.

And you don't trust them.

Sometimes you can get past this window by clicking a little "X" or "close" button in the corner or by clicking a link that says "I'm already registered", but is that really good enough? Do these features make the pop-up window less annoying for you? Of course not.

For users that are already registered, the experience is even worse. Even when you click "remember me" on a website, at some point in the near future, the website will forget who you are and you'll get the damn pop-up window in your face again. Why-oh-why would these daily deal sites want to annoy loyal customers like that?

To the daily deal website owners I say: Remove your pop-up windows. Pop-up windows may have been awesome in the 1990's, but now they are annoying. Give us a chance to get to know you first, and we will decide if we want to share our email addresses with you.

So You Want To Generate Extra Business Via A Coupon/Voucher Website? Answer These 4 Questions First

Sheldon Nesdale — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 02:36:22 +0000

If you own a small-medium sized business and you've seen coupon/voucher sites like GrabOne.co.nz, Yazoom.co.nz, Cudo.co.nz advertise other small-medium sized business with TV ads and half page ads in the NZ Herald, then you must be thinking "how do I get me some of that?"

They are offering you the potential to make thousands of sales and expose your products/services to 10's of thousands of people.

But before you get too excited, consider these 4 questions first.

Question #1: Are you happy with ZERO profit margin?

The first thing you need to do is decide if you are prepared to offer a discount of 50% to the public and provide 10-25% to the daily deal site as a commission, leaving you with 25-40% of your normal rate.

I'm guessing that is probably at (or below), your profit margin?

That's right, plan to do no better then break even on your first try.

Question #2: How much business can you handle without being crushed to death?

Set the maximum number of customers you can handle.

Is it 10?

100?

1000?

Really?

Be realistic. Using a lawn mowing business as an example, 1000 customers wanting their lawns mowed next month at 25% of your normal rate will crush your business and probably piss off 990 of those customers.

Question #3: How will you make a profit?

The third thing to do is work out how you will upsell your other services (on which you collect your full profit margin).

You also need a strategy to lock in those customers long term.

For a lawn mowing business example, you could ask them to agree to a mowing schedule for the next 12 months, set those appointments in now, and get them to fill in an automatic payment form on the spot.

Question #4: Which daily deal website should you sign up with?

Contact all the daily deal sites and make your proposal. Most of them will turn you down (for their own reasons), but perhaps one or two will accept.

Good luck!

What do you think of this advice?

If you own a small-medium sized businesses and you've tried offering a daily deal, what did you learn? What advice do you have for others? Share your story in the comments below.

What Annoys You? What Do You Think Is Great? Your Chance To Tell Daily Deal Websites What They Need To Change

Sheldon Nesdale — Wed, 04 May 2011 23:30:59 +0000

In the context of Daily Deal websites, I want to know from you:

What annoys you?
What do you love?

This is your chance to tell the owners of New Zealand's Daily Deal websites what they need to change to make you happy. Because annoying customers is never a good idea, and doing more of what customers love is always a great idea.

I'll start us off:

It really annoys me when a daily deal site DEMANDS my email address before I've had a chance to see what deals they are offering today!
- For example: www.Cudo.co.nz
- I know why they do it, I'm sure statistics show they get more email address this way, but it is still annoying!
I love it when an "experiences" daily deal website lists all the deals throughout the country on one page!
- For example: http://www.grabone.co.nz/home
- I get to see at a glance what's in other cities that I might buy for friends/family, and it saves me from manually choosing from a list of cities in a clumsy menu
I love it when a new daily deal website launches in my city and they do movie tickets for only $5

Write your comment below starting with:

"It really annoys me when..."
"I love it when..."

Daily Deal Website Ideas That Haven’t Come to NZ Yet

Sheldon Nesdale — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 18:53:42 +0000

Here are a few Daily Deal Website ideas that haven't come to NZ yet:

"Experiences" just for men
- Have you noticed how girly most of the websites with experiences are? Manicures, pedicures, spas, tanning, haircuts etc.
- Expect to see websites focused on men this year like the USA based Dealometry.com
Aggressive collection of email addresses
- A tactic used by JumpOnIt.com.au in Australia is to ride public transport and collect email addresses from passengers (using cute guys and girls with clipboards)
- There are millions of people in NZ who still have no idea about the Daily Deal concept and this is a way to bring offline people
- However, the transport authority reprimanded JumpOnIt.com.au for annoying their passengers!
Facebook's own version of "Collective Buying"
- In February this year Facebook created a "Buy with Friends" application that uses play money in games but the model could be extended into competition for sites like Groupon.com and NZ's GrabOne.com
More Daily Deal niches
- Like PetSimply.com for USA pet owners

Have you seen Daily Deal ideas overseas that you hope to arrive in NZ soon?

Todays Changes To The Lists of Daily Deal Websites (10 Feb 2011)

Sheldon Nesdale — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 19:00:09 +0000

Lots of changes to the order of the lists today.

I don't do this often because I'm sure you have your favourites and you have memorised where they are in the list, but chin-up, you'll get used to it.

Old "More" Daily Deal Websites List:

1-Day.co.nz
3Deals.co.nz
DealADay.co.nz
6shooter.co.nz
DaySale.co.nz
CrazySales.co.nz
TodaySale.co.nz
MightyApe.co.nz
GameADay.co.nz
Ziwi.co.nz
DailyCharity.co.nz
BookShake.co.nz
TradeMe.co.nz Daily Deals
OneDollar.co.nz
EzyDeal.co.nz
OffTheBack.co.nz
AdultToyMegaStore.co.nz
DailyBeat.co.nz
FirstinHome.co.nz
FreeDeals.co.nz
Gumboot.co.nz
1day3deals.co.nz

New "More" Daily Deal Websites List:

3Deals.co.nz [+1]
CrazySales.co.nz [+4]
DealADay.co.nz [no change]
1-Day.co.nz [-3]
DaySale.co.nz [no change]
6Shooter.co.nz [-2]
OneDollar.co.nz [+7]
OffTheBack.co.nz [+8]
DailyCharity.co.nz [+2]
EzyDeal.co.nz [+5]
MightyApe.co.nz [-3]
TradeMe.co.nz Daily Deals [+1]
FreeDeals.co.nz [+7]
TodaySale.co.nz [-7]
AdultToyMegaStore.co.nz [+2]
GameADay.co.nz [-7]
FirstInHome.co.nz [+2]
Ziwi.co.nz [-8]
Gumboot.co.nz [+2]
BookShake.co.nz [-8]
DailyBeat.co.nz [-3]
1day3deals.co.nz [new]

The order of this list is determined by clicks (plus I artificially placed my wifes DailyCharity.co.nz website at #9 just because I can and because I think the website is cool).