Posts Tagged ‘glenglobe’
Enticing customers with online coupons?
19 May. 2008 | Author: For many years in the USA, vouchers/coupons have been a much loved advertising form, which has recently spread wide across the Internet. In fact, there is a real boom at the moment in the States, promoting online-coupons for bargain hunting.
This is discussed by news agency Pressetext (pte) in a recent report. Revealed by the USA internet market-research firm ComScore, hits for the special Coupon-Portals such as Coupons.com or RetailMeNot.com, rose a healthy 38% in March 2008, compared to figures for 2007, to a total of 281 Million. The reason for this growing consumer interest in the discount sites, is seen to be the worsening economic climate and increasing consumer prices.
Rebate-items are not only found and printed from coupon sites in the US– local search services like Google Maps or Mojopages.com have recognized the viability of Vouchers, especially for smaller and medium-sized undertakings. Coupons are now accessible through these local search services both for location-search specific clientele, and also can attract clients to visit firms directly and thereby soften them up for purchasing.
In Germany, this form of advertising has not yet been launched by local search engine services. Only the online-directory glenglobe.de has offered featured firms the possibility of presenting special-offers, or rebates and vouchers to online customers.
Wouldn’t it make sense, if other local search engines and directories [in the German-speaking region] were to expand their offerings through the option of online rebate-coupons or vouchers? In so doing, the users benefit and the participating firms themselves gain from offering value-for-money, also benefitting from growing site visits.
Posted in General, Discussion, Local Search, Practical features | 
Tags: Coupons, Coupons.com, glenglobe, google maps, Mojopages.com, Rabattmarke, Rabattscheine, RetailMeNot | 
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New (German) web directory: glenglobe.de
“…Show yourself” – using this catch phrase, the new local branch-directory glenglobe.de was launched officially early in 2008.
This motto is aimed especially at small and medium-sized concerns, for which glenglobe.de is meant to be a platform. Undertakings are urged to present themselves and their team to the customers at large, and publicize their goods and services.
The management of glenglobe.de GmbH in Berlin, made public the launch in a press statement, and announced various functions available. Company owners are able to upload photo galleries, logos and background information (such as opening times, etc.) In addition, a virtual business card (vCard) is offered, on which they can display an image and contact details. One of the innovations offered (as yet unlike most USA or German local directories or search engines) is the provision of printable coupons/discount vouchers, which customers may download. Further, the visitor can also access events and current themes/news. All these three cornerstones of this service (i.e.. coupons, events and news) are easily edited and updated by subscribing firms and service providers, allowing glenglobe.de to call itself “the living online-directory.”
The location of a participating firm is displayed on a Google Map. Missing however is a route planner, which is unfortunate. However there are a bunch of other features, such as a “Recommend” button, a “Skype” option, or a counter that allows the registered undertaking to keep track of visitors to their entry, or the selection of “glenletters” (flags for future usage). ‘Glenletters’ allow visitors to subscribe to their firms of choice. Subscribers are informed as soon as any of their flagged companies have changed or updated their glenglobe.de presence.
This service is still in the Beta-phase, and at present, a company entry is offered free for 6 months, as announced by glenglobe.de director Anita Tusch in the company blog. The planned monthly cost after the beta-phase has been announced as 9,90 Euro (as seen in the FAQs). Companies need to commit to a minimum of one year’s subscription.
The idea of this offering is good. However at present there are very few entries, as the principle is based on the self-entry and participation of firms or service providers. As a consequence, the service is still relatively unusable by visitors, looking for goods and services in their immediate locality. The question is whether companies will accept the paid subscription model, after the end of the beta-phase. There are already numerous free local search services, such as Google Maps, where one can present a business to the public.
