Will Services Like Groupon Now and GrouponLive Arrive in Indonesia?

There are two news from Groupon appeared recently, the first is Groupon Now!. Although these services were featured since late April, but just they just went live a few days ago. Another one is news about joint venture between Groupon and LiveNation which will launch a service for online ticketing.

GrouponNow! gives a more niche offer, not only offering a discount coupon per day but also for certain time. It provides an opportunity for discount seekers to buy tickets when they are going to lunch or some other times. The user can view the offerings on the website or the mobile app. While GrouponLive, although the service is not yet available, it will provide concert tickets / local music events with a blend of facilities from Groupon and LiveNation (Ticketmaster).

Talking about Groupon now also means talking about Indonesia, because Groupon now has acquired Disdus which is coming to serve the Indonesian market. The question is whether these two services will also be implemented in Indonesia?

The answer might be too early to see whether they - Groupon, will launch this or a similar service with Groupon Now! and GrouponLive also in Indonesia, because Groupon Now! applies only in limited areas in the U.S., while GrouponLive's type and offers are still a bit unclear because it has not been released. In short description, it will only offer tickets to music events within a limited time, also in the U.S.

Frankly I really hope Groupon will also implement various strategies that they apply in the U.S. for Indonesia in order to encourage innovation from various daily deals - another group buying services in Indonesia that have arisen and will continue to emerge.

Indeed, life cycle of the daily deals services and group buying in Indonesia is too early to be assessed, despite the continued promotion which marks the capital for greater spending for promotion but the durability of this business is debatable because these discount coupon service trends is emerged in Indonesia not even a year yet.

But with the mushrooming of services like these, innovation is needed to win the competition and keep each service provides more value, both for merchants or consumers, and services such as Groupon Now! and GrouponLive could be a refreshment from discounts only and almost the same with similar services.

Some daily deals services did try to give some added value, such as Lapar.com with their community, or focusing on providing promotional media such as DealKeren, but it takes more than just community approach or media promotions for merchants, there must be innovation from basic services that they offer. Of course, behavior in Indonesia can not be equated with Groupon consumer environment in the U.S.. There must be a local approach by Groupon and other services to generate innovations, but amid the trend promotional discount coupons and also location-based services, looks like offering like Groupon Now! can be introduced and applied in Indonesia.

This might be also a threat to location-based services that provide facilities for the merchants owner to conduct a campaign (discount promotion and maybe offer a discount coupon), but in my opinion, daily deals service  - group buying and location-based services, both need innovation, especially for the local sphere. The question of whether the various features of Groupon in the original country will also be applied in Indonesia still unanswered, and appears also new questions about whether similar service will also be running a similar thing or find and run a new innovation first. What's your opinion?

Description source of the Groupon Now! Service from TheNextWeb and GrouponLive here.

Translated by Nita Sellya.