Posts Tagged ‘special offers’

Vi’s Top Voucher Picks for August

Friday, August 28th, 2009

I thought it was about time I had another look through the vouchers that are on offer via BView, and let you know which ones are my favourites.  There are some good ones on there at the moment too, vouchers that can save you a pretty penny if you use them right!

My first pick is a freebie (well I do like a good freebie!).  Lots of youngsters are generally thinking about learning to drive at this time of year, and it’s an expensive thing to do.  Well up and down the country there are a few driving schools listed on BView at the moment who are offering free lessons.
Lakeside School of Motoring in Dorchester, Starfish Driving in Weston-Super-Mare, Devans Driver Training in Plymouth, and Walkers Driving School in North Lanarkshire are all offering the first lesson free.  SLK Driving school in Blackpool is offering a free lesson when you refer a friend – the more friends you refer, the more lessons you get for free. All good stuff!

My second voucher pick is for Zizzi Italian restaurant who are offering a choice of two deals at the moment.  The first is two main meals for £10, and the second is buy one main meal, get the second for just £1.  Both are excellent deals as Zizzi do some really nice food.

For my third pick, I’ve stuck with the food theme again, and it’s another fab deal this time from Pizza Express who are offering Free pizza when you buy any other pizza at full menu price.  It is only available on collection, and there are a couple of exclusions, but it’s still a great way of having a really nice meal on the cheap.

How many of you can’t wait for the kids to go back to school?  Well here’s one for any of you who need to buy back to school items and just can’t face taking the little dears into town!  M&S are offering Free delivery on school wear with the code SCHOOL09 as well as having lots of 3 for 2 offers on school wear items.

Finally, my last pick for this month, is one that is close to my own heart being a green issue.  Clean and Green Ltd. Are offering 20% off all orders placed and free delivery by using the link on the BView site.  Now that is a good way to try a green cleaning product if you’ve not already done so before!

Good luck, and feel free to let me know what your favourite vouchers are too.

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Vouchers Revisited

Wednesday, July 15th, 2009

You might remember back in March BView made it possible for businesses to add vouchers and promotions to their listings. Our voucher directory has been growing ever since and now includes tens of thousands of vouchers, making us the largest single source of vouchers in the UK.

If you’re business isn’t displaying a voucher, you might be missing out.

Why should I add a voucher?
By adding a voucher your business will be included in the BView voucher directory. Businesses from our voucher directory are seen more across the BView site. Businesses with vouchers will have the edge over those without as everyone likes a bargain – it gives the customer one more reason to choose you over a competitor. You’ll also be included in our fortnightly newsletter that gets sent to tens of thousands of BView members

We’ve also been working hard to build distribution partners to get your offers seen by the widest audience possible. Just last month we partnered with Google so that vouchers from BView businesses are displayed as part of the listings on Google Maps. We’re putting the finishing touches to other exciting partnerships too!

What does it cost?
Nothing.
It’s completely free.

Any business on BView can add a voucher as part of their standard profile. Once you’ve claimed your listing just click on the “Add a voucher” link from the menu on the right.

What sort of special offer should I make?
This really depends on your business. Percentage discounts are always popular, but you might prefer to offer a free gift, or 2 for 1 deal. Mail order companies find that free delivery is always a winner, and if none if these suit you, then you could try a free quote or initial consultation.

How do I add a voucher?
If you haven’t already, then start by claiming your business on BView.

Once you’ve done this just login and follow the “Add a voucher” link displayed in the green box on the right hand side of your profile. It should be straight forward from there!

If you’ve got any suggestions, feedback or voucher success stories then please share them below in the comments.

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The consumer trap

Tuesday, March 17th, 2009

Everyone likes the idea of something for nothing, however, where loyalty cards are concerned, the phrase ‘It’s too good to be true’ may hit the nail on the head.
Loyalty cards came into common use in the mid 1990’s, a stroke of marketing genius which saw supermarket giants market shares entirely unbalanced and a terrifying customer retention. This galvanised the opposing chains into action and in just two years loyalty cards were rife.

Tesco and Sainsbury battled head to head, Safeway briefly stepped in but retreated to no mans land, later being aquired by Wm Morrisons and Boots stomped all over the concept. Each promising their own advantages, each touting their perks as discounts and bonuses for loyalty and for each promise we sold our souls, arming them with ways to make us spend more money, allowing them lead us into temptation with extra points and lower prices.

Now the face of shopping may have changed forever. Each of us has given the much needed market research data about our habits, if we live alone or are on a diet if we eat meat or live on convenience foods. In fact, they’ll know what you’ve been up to if you buy a pregnancy test and what the result was if you start buying nappies. Then they’ll target you, with coupons and extra points vouchers, tempting you to buy more expensive brands than you usually might, or to wean your baby on a more expensive food, which if your child likes, you’ll buy more often and they’ll reap the reward on the profit. Genius!

Our shopping habits are hoarded on computers and sometimes sold to others for greater market power and we agree to that.

Generally the power lies very much with the shop. The card holder is targeted and tormented, given incentives and persuasions to buy what the store needs to shift or to move the customer up a brand level.

It’s rare that these cards will offer enough to the user to warrant the sale of information but there just a few which make it worthwhile if you don’t mind your preferred toilet paper type being bandied around.
Tesco have a catalogue of offers to choose from, other than simply cashing the coupons instore against your groceries. In the catalogue, your coupons are worth 4x as much, so £5 of coupons gives you £20 of treats in the catalogue.
I thought I had managed well to get breakdown cover for two people on two vehicles using my coupons, until I read on MoneySavingExpert.com about those who had new cars as a result of super clever offers shopping. Changing their eating habits to suit whatever maximised their points and taking the resulting coupons to the car chain involved, driving away with brand new vehicles and with less than two years grocery shopping. Every penny recouped in a car.

Tesco hold a significant 32% market share (compared to 16% each for Sainsburys and Asda), the exchange for the brand new cars which slipped off the forecourts via Clubcard vouchers, until the supplier Motorpoint, ceased their cooperative with Tesco in 2008.
Still, with record profits in the region of 2.8 billion this time last year and the strongest loyalty card legacy, I doubt it made much of a dent.

Boots have a whole legion of shoppers who sniff out the bargains and how best to spend on each item, maximising coupon returns and discounts. A recent example was the 97p sachet of Pantene conditioner, which yielded a 100 point return on the Boots Advantage card, a profit of 3p. By purchasing ten Pantene sachets, I could achieve a return of 1,000 Boots points to make my originally intended purchase, technically getting the sachets free of charge and a 30p profit. In a further manoeuvre of super savvy shopping, if those purchases were broken into groups of £5 or slightly more, a coupon was given out which entitled the bearer to £5.00 off Boots own No.7 products.
If you had originally intended to buy a pack of No.7 face wipes (5.50) and a bottle of No.7 cellulite body lotion(£5.00) you would ultimately transfer £9.70 into 1,000 points on your card, spend a further 50p and leave with £20.50 of products.

The loyalty card could prove to be more useful than it was intended with such detailed knowledge of offers and loopholes, turning the previously unrewarding cards back into the two way street we were originally led to believe they were.

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