One day after the deal heard around the Internet, with LivingSocial’s Amazon 50% off coupon, the deals offered returned to normal with half off SCUBA lessons, vein treatments, and pizza. Â It was amazing to see how many people were sending links to the coupon yesterday.
Here is my issue with these coupon services. Â They are turning into a commodity, whereby, anyone can enter the market. Â Heck, when I was at AOL, I was sharing a cab with Ned Brody, who is head of Paid Services, in July and he was telling me about launching a local coupon service. Â By October we had the service up and running internally and by November it was out the door. Â That is scary fast to get a service up and running that is almost identical to a company that is about to file a $15B IPO. Â Tonight, thanks to Mashable, we now know Google is launching Google Offers in the near future as well.
So while one day does not make a coupon service, I am not sure if LivingSocial did 10 days of Amazon coupons that it would ensure their financial existence either.