September 27, 2011, Toronto – Mobile Fringe has launched Push a Deal, billed as the first service to use willing consumers’ smartphone GPS locations to send them deals when they cross the “geo-fence” and enter a participating store’s immediate vicinity.
Since its launch in late 2008, Mobile Fringe has built a mobile retail platform with more than one million user impressions through retail shopping apps such as the Toronto Eaton Centre and Yorkdale Shopping Centre apps. Now the company is launching a mobile location-based service where deals are presented and pushed to users who are truly in the right place at the right time.
Push a Deal is rolling out in Toronto first and will expand to other Canadian cities over the ensuing months. Consumers in Vancouver and Montreal can already download the app and have existing local group deals sent to them.
“Despite the success of the group buying model and deal-of-the-day websites, today’s young consumers are on their phones, not their computers,” said Steve Sorge, CEO of Mobile Fringe. “Push a Deal is an acknowledgment of that shift and is the first service dedicated to delivering deals based on where a person is standing. When you are close to the deal, you will get an alert.”
Push a Deal does not put a threshold on the level of discount a retailer offers. It takes 25 per cent of the deal amount, leaving the rest for the retailer. The compensation model means companies only pay Push a Deal when someone actually redeems an offer, unlike many deal-of-the-day websites.
“The financial model of the deal-of-the-day websites, where retailers only receive 25 per cent of a product or service’s retail price is simply unsustainable for businesses,” said Sorge. “Push a Deal offers a risk free, strategic marketing tool for retailers who want to actually increase traffic without decimating their bottom line.”
Push a Deal has a link where retailers can sign up, create an offer online, and start pushing deals. Retailers can choose when to send out deal alerts based on inventory or how busy they are, therefore driving foot traffic when they actually need it.
For the first two months, all deal redemptions for new stores will be free.
A recent Microsoft study of 1,500 people in the U.K., U.S., Canada, Japan, and Germany found that 51 per cent had used a location-based service, and 62 per cent were aware of such services. Young men aged 18-34 are the primary drivers of adoption. Across all countries, a whopping 94 per cent of location-based services users said they found them valuable. Four-in-10 use location-based services once a week and perceived value increases with use as the services become ingrained in day-to-day life.
Print this page
