laurenkuhlman

Text MEALS to 90999 to give $5 to the Chicago Food Depository. I do it quite frequently when some joyous happenstance comes my way or when I spend a bit too much on myself.

I don't see Groupon, or any of the clones as a good investment, for a very simple reason: there's no network effect. In the social realm, thats really the key. Social networks like LinkedIn, FaceBook and Twitter increase their value with each additional user. Telephones are also a classic example of the network effect. Groupon does not become more useful to me the more users it has. Possibly, it becomes more useful to merchants but from the merchant's I've discussed this with, other sites simply offer them better terms and, therefore, more profit.

Personally, I think sunchild had a great point by addressing that the artificial scarcity is gone. Myself, and my peers, have now reverted to buying these deals on-demand. If I want a massage deal, I head over to YipIt (an aggregator) and do a quick search. I don't waste my time reading their emails.

SwellJoe and GentleBen also addressed the same issue: lack of loyalty. My biggest complaint as a person on constant data overload is that Groupon (I use the Android app) now sends me over a dozen deals per day, half of them for suburban restaurants which I would never patronize. Its no better than coupon books or every other "deal" marketing ploy now.