Lost in the controversy that is Groupon ‘s ad parody of situations in Tibet, is the fact that this was only one of four Daily Deal commercials that aired during the Super Bowl broadcast. While the American public didn’t greet these ads as warmly as they did for Volkswagen’s Darth Vader ad or even the coworker-chimpanzees driving cars commercial, the ads aired by the Daily Deal companies were still quite effective. This is because of two main reasons: the fact that the controversy Groupon caused attracted attention to both themselves and the industry, and the fact that both Groupon and LivingSocial were able to afford some the most expensive commercial slots in existence. The Daily Deal Industry secured for itself many future customers, even if Groupon offended some of them momentarily.
Of course when you have an audience of 163 million people, commercial time is going to be quite expensive. There were four Daily Deal commercials in total, as LivingSocial.com also featured an advertisement. Even though they did not all air during the Super Bowl’s official airtime (some were during the pre-game show), there must have been some good reasons behind these companies’ ability to buy such expensive airtime.
Those reasons started with Groupon’s chief competitor: LivingSocial. To say that the Washington D.C. based website had a good month in January would be an understatement. According to Business Insider, a new infusion of money due to an agreement with Amazon.com allowed for LivingSocial to gain five million new users. Throughout January, they were able to offer half-priced Amazon gift certificates. These five million new customers represented three times more subscribers than Groupon gained during January. Feeling their advantage over the market slipping away, Groupon felt it necessary to retaliate. This led to the last minute purchasing of Super Bowl commercial time, which was used for the Tibet ad.
According to Miles Nadal, Chairman and CEO of ad-agency giant MDC Partners, Groupon’s Tibet commercial has already generated 50,000 new customers. Whether in bad taste or not, the commercial has achieved its goal. After all, when trying to shop for a great daily bargain, is the average consumer really thinking about the morality of the company? I think probably not. Most Americans have not stopped shopping at big box stores, even though they chiefly sell imported products, whose outsourcing costs America jobs. The company that can offer the lowest prices gets the sale. This will undoubtedly be the case with Daily Deals as well.
Time should show that none of the controversy caused by Groupon’s commercials will be remembered. Despite the fact that they may offended the American public with their joking about rainforest deforestization and whale conservation, and even caused public outburst by making light of the human rights disaster that is happening every day in Tibet. However, what will be remembered is that this year’s Super Bowl proved to be an important point in the growth the Daily Deal Industry. This was the point that many Americans that previously knew nothing about daily deals took a minute to stop and think about this a new way for them to save money. From now on, most Americans will know of not only Groupon.com, but also the emerging market of Daily Deals.
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