Earlier this year, many were shocked when Google offered to buy Groupon for $6 billion. Even more were surprised when Groupon turned them down. Groupon did so because they saw themselves as the leader in a marketplace that was ready to explode. What Groupon offered was a no-risk way for companies to promote themselves. Groupon had built up a database of over 70 million users that had opted in to being sold to.
Just a few months later, Groupon is no longer the only game in town. The market is flooded with Groupon-clones that aim to offer a similar service, but with their own twist that, in their opinion, separates them from the fact.
These services all follow roughly the same formula. Build a database of e-mail addresses that you send out deals to each day. The deal is typically at least 50% off regular price. The service takes 50% of the amount paid by the customers. For example, for a $20 gift certificate, a customer will pay $10, with $5 going to the restaurant and $5 going to the coupon service.
Below is a look at the four big companies that are in the marketplace as well as some emerging players.
Facebook Deals: Only currently available in five cities: Atlanta, Austin, Dallas, San Diego, and San Francisco, Facebook Deals is Facebook’s entry into the online deal marketplace. Facebook obviously has the largest footprint, with over 600 million members, and therefore offers businesses the opportunity to reach the most people. 
Facebook will also offer the ability to spread much quicker through the sharing features built in to facebook.
Groupon is the king in the marketplace, for now, boasting over 70 million active users. While Facebook has 600 million users, it is still unclear what percentage of them will opt in to this new program. Groupon is also in the most markets, by far, with 565 markets worldwide. The other wrinkle with Groupon is that the deal is not active until a certain number of customers purchase it. This provides an added incentive for people to share the news with others.
The Royal Wedding of William & Kate is this Friday. It is hard to escape this news as it has seemingly had 24 hour coverage on all new channels over the past week. Below is a guide to how to follow the event through social media, whether you have your alarm set for 4 AM on Friday or the Chicken Dance gives you nightmares.
Now is a great time to reassess your company’s marketing plan. Here are 5 things you should keep in mind as you create this marketing plan:
Paper.li: Paper.li creates a custom newspaper from your twitter feed. It takes the news, images, and videos from your Twitter Feed and organizes it a newspaper layout. For an example of what one looks like, you can check out mine at 
an unfiltered way. Rather than close off comments, Taco Bell encouraged the dialog. On their initial post, they received 438 comments. Were they all positive? Of course not. But you would be surprised. Taco Bell fans were eager to defend 
1) Incorporating Facebook into your store décor. When customers come to your place of business, a simple window cling on the entrance or a small sign at checkout will let them know that they can find you on facebook. This can be done tastefully and unobtrusively. A great place for this is anywhere people may be waiting in line. They are a captive audience, and often, have their Iphone/Droid/Blackberry in hand meaning they can instantly like you on Facebook, right from the line. If you are utilizing Facebook Places or Foursquare, you might even offer a small incentive to your loyal customers who use these services.
