The New Couponing- From Clipping to Daily Deals

Out goes the time when you only clipped coupons from the paper and used them in stores. Social Media has allowed for a multitude of opportunities and deal savings for consumers and new marketing opportunities for companies.

Blogs have opened a new way to track and share reference of which stores have the best deals and where to use your traditional coupons as well as where to find others. According to Empathica research nearly half (47%) of women are primarily using social media interaction with retailers to find coupons and promotions.

A boom of group deal sites have emerged like Groupon and Living Social that offer heavily discounted daily deals for products and services as long as a certain number of people purchase the deal.

With the widely used Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites, companies are readily giving away samples or coupons by helping to promote their brand. Many times they will require an individual to retweet a status or like the brand in order to receive the deal.

A number of websites and brand sites offer printable coupons as well as some offering mobile coupon apps.

Target is a company that is making use of many types of social media promotions. Target.com offers both printable coupons that changes on a regular basis. And they offer mobile coupons that you must subscribe to and they are sent out weekly via text messaging.

“Coupons remain a leading driver of brand interactions in social networks,” said eMarketer senior analyst Debra Aho Williamson. “At the same time, they can be one of the trickiest social media tactics to pull off. The discount offer must print or download easily and must work as promised. And the retail store or distribution channel must be prepared for demand.”   –Coupons Drive Sales on Social Media    

Graphic found on Daily Infographic

Mobile Coupons are still only accepted at some stores but they are bound to only become more widespread and commonplace. So at what point will there no longer be printed coupons? Will there always be some printed coupons or coupon circulars from weekly papers? Or will we be seeing coupons turn to a completely electronic form in the next 3-5 years?