RIP Facebook Deals
If you’ve never heard of Facebook Deals then you probably just blinked, because Facebook Deals shut down about four months after its initial launch. The idea behind Facebook Deals was to offer discounts from local and national businesses to its huge database. Sound familiar? It should, because before Facebook Deals shut down, it was intended to compete with both GroupOn and LivingSocial which essentially serve the same purpose.
Facebook Deals was a Facebook App that allowed its users to take advantage of limited deals with a time countdown much like an Ebay auction. The app displayed the price, money saved, and the duration of time the user had to purchase the deal. For example you may have two days to buy a 50 minute Thai massage for $40, not a bad deal, but no longer available since Facebook Deals shut down.
Facebook Deals Shut Down | Why?
Well after testing out Facebook Deals in five major US cities, a spokesperson had the following to report to VentureBeat explaining why Facebook Deals shut down:
“After testing Deals for four months, we’ve decided to end our Deals product in the coming weeks,” a Facebook spokesperson told Reuters. “We think there is a lot of power in a social approach to driving people into local businesses… We’ve learned a lot from our test and we’ll continue to evaluate how to best serve local businesses.”
The fact is that Facebook Deals wasn’t ready to compete with GroupOn or LivingSocial, lets take a look at those services and see what they offer.
Facebook Deals Shut Down | GroupOn
Facebook Deals shut down because of its inability to keep up with other deal-offering services like GroupOn. GroupOn also allows you to very easily connect through your Facebook account and instantly gain access to deals. There are a variety of categories, search options, and the deals are automatically catered to your surrounding area, based on your location information that GroupOn finds through your Facebook profile.
The Featured Deal is one exclusive deal that changes everyday. I’m sure businesses that sign up for the Featured Deal have to pay a pretty penny for that spot, but they are guaranteed exposure to GroupOn’s community of millions of users.
You can also browse through All Deals and explore all of the great deals on pampering, food, events, and more in your area. Just type in your zip code or address for deals closest to your home.
Finally Now! Deals our last category on GroupOn allows you to see what great deals are going down in your city within the next few days.
Basically GroupOn is an ever changing coupon book that you can have at your fingertips on both your laptop or smartphone.
Facebook Deals Shut Down | LivingSocial
Here is reason number 2 that Facebook Deals shut down, and this innovative deal-offering service goes by the name of LivingSocial. And with LivingSocial’s daily deals like lunch for a dollar, it isn’t hard to see why people are so hooked.
LivingSocial is categorized a bit different from GroupOn, and I actually prefer its customized homepage catered to your city. For example, Austin, TX has our capital’s building as the background. Also its categories: Today’s Deal, Families, Escapes, and Adventures are very creative and offer the user the choice to scroll through different kinds of deals depending on their mood, rather than a hodgepodge of everything from cheap ice cream to facelifts.
LivingSocial also sends out a daily email of %50 off deals to all of its members, this sounds cool, but I could see how these could pile up after a while along with all of those other lists you regretfully signed up to be a part of.
Facebook Deals Shut Down | What Will Facebook Do?
Well just because Facebook Deals shut down, it doesn’t mean that they are out for the count. After all, they only tested the new app in five cities over the course of four months. Their certainly must have been some minor success and plenty to learn from mistakes made. What’s bizarre is that both GroupOn and LivingSocial allow users to sign up through their Facebook accounts, the same company that can’t compete with their services allows them to use their social media platform to do business.