Living Social or Groupon

[hawthornelawncare]

Hi there have any of you run a deal on living social or groupon or any other company that lets you run deals for services? If you have what has been your experience from it..

[SECTLANDSCAPING]

Lawn care business tips

I was contacted by living social. They want you to discount your service by 50% then they get a 50% cut. So youll be working for 1/4 of your rate. I passed! From the reading I did, service companies have went out of business doing these promos or damaged there reputations. You end up having 100 people wanting the work done now and when you dont they trash you. This really only works for high mark up products.

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[LawnBoy0311]

I agree with the above post. It sounds great for someone who maybe has no overhead, or trying to get your name out there. But for making some real cash, you'll be running around like a mad man for little money. I know for a fact you'll get a lot of hits from doing it. I worked in an industry that had a ton of people who used groupon. They used to complain about how little profit it was, and these were all restaurants. Theres also an LCO where I live who did it. They got trashed talked by reviewers online because they couldn't honor the deal.

On the other hand, is there a way to do it and offer free trimming/edging with a cut? This way you could mark your price up a bit to cover some of the difference.

[DudleysLawnCare]

You got to lose some money to gain some money (contracts). So although you might be working for nothing you'll be gaining as well.

[LawnBoy0311]

Originally Posted by DudleysLawnCare

You got to lose some money to gain some money (contracts). So although you might be working for nothing you'll be gaining as well.

To an extent, your right. The people who use Groupon or Living Social are looking for deals. They aren't looking for a yearly contract, they are just looking to get a cut for as cheap as possible. This is most likely the type of customer who will sign, then cancel a month later. IMHO they are all CHEAP!

[LawnBoy0311]

This may help a little...

http://www.yelp.com/biz/eastern-grou...ntenance-bowie

[Hedgemaster]

THere was a thread on here last year about a lawn care operator who used Groupon and got screwed over royally. I think it was a "demand" issue where he had too much work at too low a price. Not good.

[SECTLANDSCAPING]

Originally Posted by LawnBoy0311

To an extent, your right. The people who use Groupon or Living Social are looking for deals. They aren't looking for a yearly contract, they are just looking to get a cut for as cheap as possible. This is most likely the type of customer who will sign, then cancel a month later. IMHO they are all CHEAP!

This is exactly what it is. A lot of companies thought that it would bring in new business. What happen was the coupon cutters bought the single sale product and that was it. They also dont follow rules and will buy more then one coupon.

You can only do it with something with high markup. Lawn mowing is out of the question. The way it works if your product cost $1 to make and your retail is $30 you can afford to sell it for $7.50. If you offer a $60 service for $15. You might as well stay at home.

The representative will tell you what you can do to. You cant just say we want to do lawn mowing. They will decide themselves. Then if you put a crazy *** price on it they wont approve it.

These people will spam you. I had dozens of phone calls and emails. While I researched it. I was going to do it in a slow month. After looking the number over I can do the same promotion without them and get customers.

But dont take my word for it. Read the reviews. Living social use to be 30% which helped a little but now there both at %50.

[Steve]

Haven't we seen a lot of companies that were ruined and put out of business because they used such sites and they ended up suing the coupon companies?

[hawthornelawncare]

Well i know living social has changed some. i just ran a deal for just mow line trim and blow for 37.00. out of that they will take 47%. So out of that i will get 19.61. I figured id give it a try and see if i can gain some customers after they use there voucher. I know some of you are gonna leave some neg comments and its okay.

I feel if you can do a good job and win the customer over then youll have there buisness. I have gotten some jobs even with being the higher price. Seems theres still some old fashion people who like honesty and how you carry yourself over being low price and you get what you pay for.

As for the deal i ran that price is after the mark down of 51% savings. Might be ball busting but you dont know inless you give something a shot. And i have it in the stipulations that its only mowing line trimming and blowing debri off. Nothing else.

On another note i look at it as free advertising.