Grabbon is Bangalore based startup that is trying to bring the power of collective bargain to the buyers. The site offers huge discounts on shopping, eating and other lifestyle spending with the standard Woot concept of 1 offer a day. The offers are valid only if a treshold number of orders are received within a given time.
The site again is a clone of Groupon and no different from Delhi based MyDala. This is not the first attempt at offering retail discount coupons online but none of them have picked up yet. On the deal side some of them have been able to get few renowned retailers but the offers are really not convincing in such cases. Startups need to realise that plain discount sites do not really work in India. Sites that attempt to bring users for some other reason and then cross sell the coupons to them would always find more takers. Say if a local search offers such coupons then it would surely be more sensible. Else, few half baked attempts will kill the idea of online coupon distribution even before it takes off.
Your take?
[Naman is a startup enthusiast and has worked with couple of Indian startups as Product Manager. He writes at The Inspire Blog]
Its a little too much to say plain discount sites will not work in India there is obvious scope in this field. The trick is to see why groupon works which is because it can acquire large number of users through social media at no cost to itself and not through spending on google. Since social media is the only thing that works in indian internet if you have a good sales team which can crack deals in at least top 8 cities and you get a good viral traction there is a potentially decent market here in group discounting
Very valid point Abhishek. Social media can help but i am yet to see any social media virality in India. The pink chaddi campaign did work but mostly because it was taken up by the main stream media. An action oriented India specific viral has not yet been witnessed. In this case we would require a city specific viral. Which again is difficult.
There are few more clones of Groupon – http://www.koovs.com & http://www.bindaasbargain.com
Grabbon seems to have good backing, they are marketing through FM channels.
Hitesh
http://www.vcbytes.com
I’d love to see netizens doing “aakraman” on retail outlets
like they do in China.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuangou
Naman, will give you the benefit of doubt as clearly you havent thought through the model and its long term potential before writting off a decent attempt abruptly and coldly – the model isnt about discounts – its also about creating a unique marketing platform for SME service retail brands across the city(and country). its not about selling the coupons but the viral marketing users do to get these coupons is what the vendor is intrested it (or else the actual sale is a loss for them). so if 10 pple buy it, 10,000 read about it and spread it to another 10,000 – its the network effect
a local search offering coupons – nah thats a completely different model and wont lead to any “marketing” effect
neither is this a woot concept – woot is a sales platform for products, this would be a marketing platform for retail services
IMHO for a layman we expect statements like above but not from plugged.in !
I do understand the viral marketing part of it. The WoM that would be generated for the business is far more valuable than the immediate sales generated. I dont call this idea bad but the attempt here is half baked without thinking through how the first set of users would really come to know of each offer. You cannot expect him to check the website daily. And also the Indian public is still to understand the idea of mCoupons and value it. When you copy or get inspired of a US model do it with some Indian customization. Do NOT copy paste. McD had to customize. PizzaHut customized. Even SMSgupshup customized twitter to an Indian format.
The reason why i mentioned local search is that to make the word spread over the social media we would need a reasonable base of seeder’s. People who would come to know of the offers first and then spread it across their network. Local search is where one would land up regularly and is contextual. So if the offer is promoted there it would find more connectors.
There is lesser chance that i would subscribe to the facebook/twitter stream of a service that i would use may be ones in six months. So how would i really come to know of the daily deals?
Woot is mentioned for the “one deal one day” concept that was brought to web by them.
Hi Naman, its not one deal a day in this case can vary depending on the deal terms – woot was a pinoneer that doesnt mean any1 attempting anything on those lines doesnt get credibility.
I frankly find it ammatuerish to write off copycats – id call them “inspired” – i agree about customisations to local consumer behavior wherever required – but not for the sake of it – if something isnt broken why fix it, why re-invent the wheel just to prove a point and salvage credibility from certain “startup reviewers” – coz trust me business is about execution not about ideas – it doesnt matter if you borrowed from som1 else – that’s fine as long as it creates value for customers and stakeholders.
Agreed its a challenge getting users to regularly know of each deal is a toughie – but thats where alliances and tools like creating widget based publisher network can help keep getting old and new customer back regularly – also dont forget the email alerts – consumers would end up opening them and atleast checking out the deal even if they buy once in six months – its not about sales but about the visibility the vendor thus gets by listing himself on such a platform…thats the key of this model
pizza hut/macd all customised but not overnight – they started by replicating their US counterparts and slowly kept customising based on feedbacks and observation…so dont jump to conclusions right away – encourage startups and give them the benefit of doubt perhaps
I agree mostly!
You are right on “its not about Idea but execution”. Site design and copy is a execution thing not a idea thing. And that is copied/inspired.
And of course our wishes and all possible encouragements is there for you. And this review and the “not so welcomed” feedback is also part of it. Isn’t that the way it should be?
Peace
Please compare the terms and conditions and privacy policy of grabbon and groupon.
I will call these attempts to do a word-for-word rip-off pretty ‘amateurish’
surely Naman, just gave my two cents on this whole journalistic cry over inspired models – hardly handful of established internet models in India – and all of them were heavily borrowed from west – be in naukri.com or ebay(bazee). by execution didnt mean design – meant getting the vendors, procing to them the marketing power of the platform, getting enough userbase to make this sustainable, managing large sales team across the country optimially….anyways let it be
I hope they will get good market share, as compitition already started Good luck guys !
Many people may start with the same idea, but some execute better than others. And execution is not just the initial one. Eventually consumers evolve and companies that evolve with changing consumer needs emerge winners. Being the first one or a clone becomes quite meaningless then. Cheers!
http://www.wooqer.com