Social buying
The rise in services such as Groupon and Dell’s Swarm late last year should put everyone on notice that social buying is terraforming the channel.
It falls broadly into the “deal-a-day” category and group buying websites that accrete buyers to a reseller’s or retailer’s offers.
Both originated in the US, the original Woot.com giving rise to Zazz.com.au, catchoftheday.com.au and even traditional etailers are getting on board.
Although the concept of group buying lived underground on enthusiast and specialist forums for years, it took Groupon (Stardeals. com.au) to bring it to the masses.
These services aimed at the consumer can also be tailored for a business audience. They are suited to runout, end-of-life and surplus stock clearance to generate cash flow through volume. But there’s no reason they can’t also be used to sell services, such as capacity and service tickets and to build awareness especially for VARs moving into new business.
Social buying isn’t for everyone but this year, if you don’t have a strategy that embraces group buys or daily deals, you better have a good reason.
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