Google Maps users will be able to access coupons from more than 20,000 advertisers.
While Craigslist takes on the classifieds, Google Inc. lately announced it will soon be displaying printable discount coupons to local shoppers, in a promotional bid that aims to drive U.S. online shoppers using its Google Maps service to visit stores for everything from pizza to car washes, as the search giant makes a move designed to appeal to peoples’ appetites for a bargain, the company said in a statement.
The world’s top Web search supplier is taking advantage of the marketing tool, which is traditionally used by small businesses, to entice U.S. consumers to seek out savings from local retailers such as dry cleaners, pizza delivery restaurants and auto repair shops.
More than 20,000 coupons are expected to be available when the new service has its debut on Google’s popular mapping service.
Google has partnered with Cox Enterprises Inc.’s Valpak Direct Marketing Systems, which has been mailing envelops stuffed with coupons and discount offers for nearly 40 years. Consumers will be able to receive local Valpak printable coupons online through a partnership that began Aug. 15 between Valpak and Google Inc.
Under the partnership, the search giant will pair its Google Maps service with Valpak, based in Largo, Fla., and plans to provide Google with nightly updates to expand the supply of coupons from a list of neighborhood merchants that will include pizzerias, auto shops, dry cleaners and handymen. These coupons can be printed directly from a computer and redeemed at a store location or local business.
We are very pleased to be the launch partner with Google to offer Valpak’s print-at-home online coupons to more consumers and to give Valpak merchants valuable enhanced distribution tied to their existing listing on Google Maps, said Todd Leiser, vice president and general manager for Valpak.com, Valpak’s online coupon portal.
“Valpak’s blue envelope has been a North American institution for nearly 40 years and has the type of real consumer value that is perfect to support Google’s mission statement of organizing the world’s information.”
Google is the first to offer coupons, which not only appeal to cost-conscious consumers but also offer advertisers a reliable way to gauge the success of an ad campaign.
We believe this is going to be a nice way for merchants to understand the impact of their online presence and marketing on their offline sales, said Gokul Rajaram, a product management director at Google.
Here’s an example of how the service works: consumers can go to Google’s home page, type into the search box “pizza restaurants near Manhattan,” and it will take the searcher to a page listing all of the pizza restaurants near Manhattan. Those that have a Valpak coupon associated with its listing on Google will have a link that says “coupon.” Consumers can print out the coupons and redeem them at the local business.
Valpak merchants that participate in Valpak.com will be able to be printed directly from Google, according to Mr. Leiser. New coupons from Valpak merchants are added on a nightly basis to ensure the most recent offers are available.
The deal does not alter Valpak’s online offerings. Consumers can still sign on to Valpak.com directly and print out coupons, Mr. Leiser said.
Google also is encouraging businesses to submit their own discount coupons directly to the search engine index, using a simple Web-based template, giving small businesses — even ones that do not have their own Web sites — an easy way to attract hard-to-reach online shoppers. Links to the available discounts will automatically appear when Google’s users are looking for local business information on the mapping service.
“One of the challenges small businesses face today is the lack of an ability to contend with online users,” said Shailesh Rao, Google’s director of local search. “We know it is a practical fact — Small businesses rely on coupons,” he said.
When Google users search for local information, discount coupons from U.S. businesses now are displayed on Google Maps http://www.maps.google.com, search results and business listing pages. The company may expand the program to other markets in Europe and Asia in coming months, Rao said.
Although the Mountain View, Calif.-based company is not charging merchants or consumers, the coupon service could still help boost Google’s rapidly rising profits by giving people another reason to use the search engine’s website instead of other destinations.
Any merchant is eligible to sign up to offer coupons, at no charge, on Google Maps at Google’s Local Business Center, according to a statement. Businesses simply log into the Local Business Center at Google Maps to enter in coupon information www.google.com/local/add. There they can also add and update their business listings for Google Local. Once coupon information is entered, the coupon is displayed on Google Maps within hours.
This answers the general problem that exists in the online world of demonstrating the value of how much real-world traffic online marketing actually drives into stores, said Greg Sterling, an analyst with Sterling Market Intelligence in Oakland, California who specializes in local Web search.
In seeking to bridge the online and offline shopping worlds, Google’s discount-coupon push marks another competitive challenge for newspaper publishers, which have typically relied upon inserted advertising coupons as a source of revenue.
By expanding its audience, Google gets more opportunities to display the short, text-based ads that account for most of its revenue. Although Google distributes the ads all over the Web, the company makes more money when people visit its site and click on the paid messages.
Within the next few months, Google plans to give advertisers the option of promoting a coupon offer — an alternative that would generate more revenue for the company.
Sterling said the coupons may attract more users to Google Maps.
In the traditional offline world, coupons drive a lot of business, and they have not been well-explored online, he said. "It is also a marketing tool for local businesses and it does not cost anything" beyond the discount given to customers.
The partnership is a way to enhance the coupon’s digital distribution, Mr. Leiser said.
The benefit for the merchant is increased distribution, he said adding, “We are enabling our Valpak.com merchants to get exposure for their coupons on a major search engine.”
Google’s benefit is that they have immediate enhanced content for their searchers. "So, instead of just a map and an address and phone number, there is a call-to-action," Mr. Leiser said.
If the coupons move encourages local businesses to begin adding themselves to Google’s local listings, the Maps product will become more relevant to users. The more relevant and useful Google Maps is to users, the more it becomes a desired space for advertisers seeking their clicks.
JupiterKagan analyst Sapna Satagopan told internetnews.com it is an effort to get local business thinking about online marketing. “Google is smart to form relationships with local businesses that might not be ready to pay for online advertising yet, she said.”
"I think it creates a talking point between Google and the local advertisers," she said.
It also poses a challenge for established direct marketers which distribute coupons. Direct online rivals to Valpak include CoolSavings.com, a unit of privately held newspaper publishing and broadcast company Landmark Communications Inc.
"America is the country in which price is king," said Kurt Barnard, president of consulting firm Retail Forecasting Group. "Every marketing ploy that drives a customer into a store is critical."
Google discount coupons must be printed out and presented to retailers. There are no current plans to offer the discount program to mobile phone users, who, in theory, can simply download the coupons on Web-equipped mobile phones and present the electronic screen to a store clerk. Valpak said few retailers have a secure way to manage electronic coupons.
Businesses can upload a small image to appear on the face of the coupon and create a unique identifying number in order to track coupon offers and defend against potential fraud.
Valpak targets 500 million blue envelopes through the mails to 45 million households in the United States and Canada each year. It offers coupons from 75,000 businesses a year.
Satagopan thinks Google will keep track of how many users print coupons.
That will give Google data "to go into that local advertising market and say, ‘look you have got so many coupons being printed out and those many that are being used. We can provide you more of that traffic if you want to sign up with us," she said.
They have tested a pay-per-call model, started selling radio air time, and have begun experimenting with television ads. And Satagopan thinks Google is going to get a sizeable bite out of coupon offer.
Online maps from Google and rivals Yahoo, Microsoft and AOL have been racing to offer the most bells and whistles to attract more eyeballs that can then be fed advertisements.
The coupon service is the latest in a string of deals that Google has struck with media giants like the Associated Press, Viacom and News Corp., owner of Mysapce.com.
The deal with Valpak will not involve any revenue sharing, unlike Google’s agreement to distribute ad-supported content from Viacom’s MTV Networks or to provide targeted text-based ads to Web sites such as MySpace.com.
It also will allow both retailers and Google to increase their knowledge about how the Internet drives traffic to stores, Mr. Leiser said. Currently, Google’s advertising business is measured by the number of times a person clicks on an ad, which is an opaque way of measuring consumer interest. By tracking the clicks, the number of printed coupons and the number of people who bring those coupons into the store, companies will be able to better understand how the Internet influences consumer behavior.
So far, the offering is only available in the U.S. and Google does not have plans at this time to expand it elsewhere, said Anna Wharton, a spokeswoman for Google in the U.K.
Google did not return a request for comment.