Google Offers was a service offering discounts and coupons. Initially, it was a

deal of the day Deal-of-the-day (also called daily deal or flash sales or one deal a day) is an ecommerce business model in which a website offers a single product for sale for a period of 24 to 36 hours. Potential customers register as members of the deal-a-day w ...

website similar to

Groupon Groupon is an American global e-commerce marketplace connecting subscribers with local merchants by offering activities, travel, goods and services in 13 countries. Based in Chicago, Groupon was launched there in November 2008, launching soon af ...

, but it later changed focus. Rather than a small number of prepaid offers, it instead offered many smaller discounts. It additionally integrated with both

Google Maps Google Maps is a web mapping platform and consumer application offered by Google. It offers satellite imagery, aerial photography, street maps, 360° interactive panoramic views of streets ( Street View), real-time traffic conditions, and rou ...

and

Google Wallet Google Wallet (or simply Wallet) is a digital wallet platform developed by Google. It is available for the Android, Wear OS, and Fitbit OS operating systems, and was announced on May 11, 2022, at the 2022 Google I/O keynote. It began rollin ...

for mobile offers. In 2014, Google announced it would be shutting the service down.

History

In 2011, Google began to drop hints of entering the Offers market. Nate Tyler, a Google spokesman, stated that the company is "communicating with small businesses to enlist their support and participation in a test of a prepaid offers/vouchers program. This initiative is part of an ongoing effort at Google to make new products … that connect businesses with customers in new ways." Users receive an e-mail with a local deal of the day. They then have the opportunity to buy that deal within a specific time limit (usually 24 hours). Unlike Groupon, an offer on Google Offers is valid regardless of how many people take it. Google Offers is powered by

Google Checkout Google Checkout was an online payment processing service provided by Google aimed at simplifying the process of paying for online purchases. It was discontinued on November 20, 2013 and the service moved to Google Wallet (now called Google Pay). ...

and integrates with

. It will also include

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

Google Reader Google Reader was an RSS/Atom feed aggregator operated by Google. It was created in early 2005 by Google engineer Chris Wetherell and launched on October 7, 2005, through Google Labs. Google Reader grew in popularity to support a number of progra ...

Google Buzz Google Buzz was a social networking, microblogging and messaging tool that was developed by Google which replaced Google Wave and integrated into their web-based email program, Gmail. Users could share links, photos, videos, status messages and ...

and e-mail sharing options. Google Offers development information was leaked after a failed attempt by Google to buy Groupon for US$6 billion in December 2010. On April 21, 2011, via

Google Places Google Maps is a web mapping platform and consumer application offered by Google. It offers satellite imagery, aerial photography, street maps, 360° interactive panoramic views of streets ( Street View), real-time traffic conditions, and rou ...

Facebook page, it was announced that "Offers BETA is coming", and provided a link to a signup page listing a few select cities, with the first beta city being

Portland, Oregon Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers, Portland is the county seat of Multnomah County, the most populous co ...

. On May 26, 2011, the service was officially launched; the first offer was on June 1, for Floyd's Coffee Shop in Portland. During its first month, the most popular deal was $20 worth of

Powell's Books Powell's Books is a chain of bookstores in Portland, Oregon, and its surrounding metropolitan area. Powell's headquarters, dubbed Powell's City of Books, claims to be the largest independent new and used bookstore in the world. Powell's City of ...

merchandise for $10: "5,000 Powell’s vouchers sold out in a matter of hours." That deal's price turned out to be Google Offers' median offer price for the month. On July 12, 2011, service was expanded to New York and the

San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area Go ...

. On July 4, 2012, Google Offers Chrome extension was launched. This extension has been "retired". On March 6, 2013, offer extensions in AdWords was launched, allowing businesses to distribute promotions through their AdWords campaigns. These offers are discoverable when a user searches for a business, brand, product, or service. They save the offer to their Google Account from the Search ad and then redeem in-store or online. In March 2014, Google announced that it would be shutting the service down.

References

{{Google Inc. Sales promotion Online retailers of the United States Incentive marketing companies Internet properties established in 2011 Marketing companies established in 2011 Deal of the day services Google Chrome extensions

Offers ''Offers'' is a 2005 Dutch television film directed by Dana Nechushtan and starring Maryam Hassouni and Jacob Derwig. The thriller film is a personal drama about suicide bombers and counter-terrorism in Western Europe. In 2006 Maryam Hassouni ...

History

See also

References