Over at Zip2Save, a recently launched local deal finding site, the early signs of a partnership between LocalPoint Media and Suburban Newspapers of America (Zip2Save’s two parent companies that jointly control it) and ShopLocal are now visible.
Currently the Target weekly ad that ShopLocal provides services for is being pulled into Zip2Save’s site via ShopLocal’s SmartDelivery API (SDAPI). Metroland (a Canadian firm that is wholly owned by Torstar) is the technology provider behind Zip2Save that did the Target weekly ad integration, which appears to have ported out their publishing platform that Metroland Media Group uses to power Flyerland.ca, a Canadian focused weekly ad, deals and coupon site.
The current Target circular presentation and user experience is very basic, with only page views. So no browse by brand, category or keywords. No hotspots, rollovers or item detail pages. Just circular page flipping / viewing at this time.
The ShopLocal team is hopeful that both Target will see success with this content integration and that Zip2Save will continue to iterate and improve the weekly ad browsing experience to make it more rich, robust and engaging.
As a side note, ShopLocal is also powering the Lowe’s circular that is shown within Zip2Save via an iFrame integration to a ShopLocal hosted Lowe’s SmartCircular site.
Shopper, the top selling iPhone shopping assistant from ReachEverywhere, has launched a successful integration of all of the localized on-sale content (e.g., retailer circular data) that ShopLocal has to offer. At its core, the Shopper iPhone app is a shopping list management tool – and ReachEverywhere has incorporated ShopLocal’s local circular content across the retailer’s consumer know and trust to aid the app users in their decision making process in a seamless user interface.
Here is a snippet of the release notes that detail the ShopLocal content integration:
“Shopper is now integrated with the weekly flyers from Target, K Mart, Meijer, Babies R Us, Walgreens, Home Depot, and literally over 100 of your favorite stores (see What’s new for a complete list of stores available). You keep your shopping lists as you always have, and Shopper shows you the relevant specials from stores around you. No more flipping thru stacks of flyers on Sunday morning – saving you time and money!”
And here is what the trade publication the Progressive Grocer had to say about the app with the addition of weekly ad specials:
“Our research indicates busy consumers want to quickly pull relevant money-saving specials on what they intend to purchase rather than sift through catalogs of unrelated products from the newspaper and mail every week,” said Sean Flynn, CEO of ReachEverywhere. “This is just another step in our mission to help save shoppers time and money, and we have more coming soon.”
This is the company that is behind the 'Shopper' app
In addition to the ShopLocal circular content, the app has Guiding Stars Nutritional information on select products, allows real-time list syncing between users (send your significant other to the store with an always updated list!), coordinates multiple store lists, and keeps a running total of the amount you intend to spend.
To ensure the circular content’s relevance, the Shopper app uses the existing shopping list items as search terms to query the Shoplocal Cross-Retailer API (SCRAPI) – only returning retailer specials that are targeted to the purchase intent of today’s store visit. It’s another great example of what a creative partner can come up with using ShopLocal content.
If you have $0.99 cents to spare, its a great ap that is worthwhile to check out. Hey, you may even end up using it to help buy your groceries.
ReachEverywhere’s insight that people already have their shopping lists built before searching for weekly specials is unique. In fact, one could envision the Shopper app becoming a sort of search engine for in-store deals on the iPhone, which would create a lead generation machine for brands and retailers. For instance, if the Diaper category is a destination and basket size driver for a store- they could ensure Shopper users who intend to purchase Diapers see their circular sourced, in-store specials by sponsoring that category in the app.
The app is firmly centered around the concept of a shopping list
ShopLocal weeekly ad data shows up in all sorts of places within this app, usually under the title of "My Flyers+"
With the inclusion of the weekly ad deals across retailers, ReachEverywhere was able to increase their rankings within the iTunes app store Lifestyles category to the #7 most popular paid app, an increase of over 10 spots at the time of the release of the version of the app that contained the ShopLocal content (since then, they have fallen to #35 currently).
Spreezio, the “priceline of local shopping”, has recently launched a great beta site in which all of the local deal and sale content is being sourced directly from ShopLocal via our latest API – SCRAPI. Spreezio calls this location-based personalized shopping. What I call it is a strong, unique and focused vision that really drives at simplicity and easy of use. Look at it this way, ShopLocal.com and Spreezio both share the exact same underlying data set. However one site is very feature rich, complex and somewhat complicated at points (e.g., ShopLocal.com) while the other site is nearly featureless, stark and simple (e.g, Spreezio.com). It really is exciting to see how a fresh set of eyes (and brains) can tackle the same problem and come up with such a different answer.
The initial success metrics that Spreezio has been able to generate are very promising, with nearly one out of every 4 unique site visitors “converting” which equates to claiming at least one deal. Granted the traffic to the site is still small, but if its a good mousetrap, that can easily be solved.
The entire Spreezio user interface is focused on two things. The keyword search box and the level of desired discount that the user desires. All of this happens within the large red tag area on the homepage.
Once a user has selected a geo-location and search radius, a percentage off discount amount and entered the type of item they are interested in, the real behind the scenes magic happens (eg all sorts of filtering/matching/meta data extraction, etc). Spreezio looks at the entire ShopLocal data set and only pulls back the exact deals that meet this unique set of user defined criteria.
Once a user has narrowed in their search on a specific item of interest, the user is asked to claim the deal. Entailed within this step is learning the name and location of the retailer that is offering the deal as well as some additional product details.
There is also a lot of other great things to look forward to from Spreezio in the near term including:
- Launching an iPhone application that packs up the functionality contained within the browser based version and jams it into a nifty little mobile app.
- Integrating Google Maps into the site to better visual depict the local nature of the deals that were found that meet the user’s search criteria.
- Adding a viral spread loop that will enable a user to invite their friends to join in on the deal that they found, socially powered of course.
If you have Comcast then you’ve got to watch the On Demand Shopping channel (channel 887).
Another great example of bridging the offline world with the online world, starting in mid-November, Comcast Digital Cable customers can browse video circulars with the most up-to-date sale items traditionally featured in printed newspaper inserts from several top retailers.
The On Demand Shopping category is a partnership between Comcast, ShopLocal and Liquidus. ShopLocal is providing the local, versioned data and Liquidus is using their automated system to create the videos.
“Updating the classic sales circular for TV is a natural evolution,” said Kevin Smith, Vice President of Digital Media for Comcast Spotlight. “For retailers, Video Circulars on Demand are a tool to expand their reach to customers who are watching more and more video. For consumers, it’s another option for finding the items they’re looking for, from the comfort and convenience of their own homes.”
Selecting channel 887 on your remote control takes you to the On Demand Shopping category, where you can see the latest weekly ad circulars from several top retailers in your area.
For more information and to see a demo visit VODCirculars.com
.Starting in mid-November, Comcast Digital Cable customers can browse video circulars with the most up-to-date sale items traditionally featured in printed newspaper inserts from several top retailers. Selecting channel 887 on their remote controls takes customers to the On Demand Shopping category, where they can see the latest sale information from those stores 24×7.
Kaboodle has launched a nice weekly giveaway to help promote the new weekly shopping list feature on it’s site. This makes sense as in the web – to – store shopping model, getting users to add things to their online shopping list is one of the most valuable behaviors to encourage, as it is a great proxy for offline shopper intent.
More publishers and retailers really need to think of cheap and fun ways of promoting their weekly ad content and this is a great example. Giveaways and sweepstakes are classic, time-tested tactics that do bring new and returning users back to your site.
Fun email promotion that Kaboodle is running to drive awareness and usage of it's new weekly shopping list feature by running weekly giveaways of $100 cash to users that choose to engage with the lists.
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