TimesDeal Offers Free Deals in India
TimesDeal, a daily-deals website in India, has had a traditional revenue model up until now, charging an upfront fee of about 20-40 percent of the deal value when selling deals. However, the market in India is struggling, so deal providers are looking to shake things up a bit. TimesDeal has found its approach: free deals. The company will focus on volume with its free deals. Back on Valentine’s Day, the site ran a promotion making all deals free and saw a tenfold surge in consumption. What about revenue, you ask? The CEO of Times Internet, the company running TimesDeal, says they will consider the revenue question after a few months. “At the moment we are focused on making TimesDeal a compelling service. We want more people to use it. Once we have users, we will think about monetization.” An analyst with Gartner thinks this is more a change in marketing message than anything else. (The Times of India)
