For instance: Can merchants do their validation and redemption only by PC? Do they need real, live human phone support? Can phone IVR work instead?

Or a biggie: Do you need the tech firm to provide the credit-card processing software, or are you set up to handle the CC transactions yourself?

And what’s your anticipated sales volume? (Small for a local blognet, potentially thousands of deals a day for a major daily or TV group.) Can you afford the cash up front for a licensing deal (which allows you to keep more of the deal in the long run), or do you want your tech partner to assume some of the risk (and a bigger chunk of the reward) by doing it all on a percentage-for-service model?

All these (and more!) make it tough to recommend any one-size-fits-all solution. There’s a whole range of providers, and you should check ‘em all out. Start with Analog Analytics, Tumblr, Dealicio. But do a thorough Google search, too – it’s been about three months since I did a thorough look at the space, and I guarantee more very able competitors have emerged.

But the internet marketers are hitting this idea big time. So there is money in it.

Niche marketing is a big thing and I can see small companies will be able to generate big time traffic just like the big guys putting up a loss leader to get the people in the door.

I thought the article was informative but it did tease a bit by talking about software and then not following through.

The sale of software is changing every day and that in itself needs a big story. Small specifit ‘scripts’ are now a normal part of the internet. See the wordpress explosion. They too have a deal of the day type plug in available now.

So thanks for writing on this subject and I wish you would write some more articles and investigate the software and script phenomenon.

thanks
teddy

That sort of “that’ll never work because…” thinking is one of the reasons newspapers have largely lost the innovation race. (Besides, of course, the desperate desire to cling to monopoly ad models, of course.)

Michael, your precis is quite thorough. I’ll add only this for news organizations considering these ideas: Don’t bother developing the software yourself. It’s readily available from any number of vendors. Some will want modest licensing fees (a few thousand dollars a year); others will run the program for no cash up from, just a few percentage points of each sale.

It’s still not a slam dunk, mostly because programs like this need aggressive sales reps, and most at newspapers are (sadly) mere order-takers. But you’re right in highlighting social-buying programs as something to try now before the national players seize the space.

Oh, and @Short sighted: Remember that any idiot with a lawyer can file a lawsuit. And if you ever cashed a paycheck from a journalism organization, I guarantee you that part of that money came from people you would also find disreputable. (See also “car dealers.”)

-tgd