Freevow® vs Groupon® – Zero fees UK startup targets giant on Twitter with their alternative approach

Twitter wars are great! snappy come backs are the usual response and these make for very entertaining reading.

It looked like we could be in for a great clash last week when UK based voucher startup “Freevow” tweeted this regarding their alternative zero fees approach to providing consumers with deals;

freevow‏ @freevow
why buy a 1 hour photo shoot from @Groupon_UK when you get get one from @freevow for free! no commissi deals #justgettingstarted

This tweet was aimed at Groupons’ UK twitter account. We have seen Groupons’ Indian twitter account defend a similar tweet from company “Grab on” with devastating effect, an honest & brutal KO that “Grab On” did not defend, but Groupons’ UK twitter account had no response at all for Freevow.

Freevows’ alternative approach to providing consumers with deals, revolves around the idea of not charging businesses any fees. Freevow believe that this alternative approach allows businesses to make great deals without having to worry about large commission payments, hence “no commissi deals”.

So why no reply from Groupon on Twitter?

There are lots of possibilities here, it could be that Freevow really do have a valid point, they don’t charge any money for their service, as opposed to Groupon who often take commissions around the 50% mark and sometimes even 100%. A 100% commission sometimes means that the business will have to up-sell the customer to make any money.

Another possibility is that Groupon didn’t see the tweet, or maybe they just don’t take Freevow seriously.

Freevow are very small & new, with only 90 businesses registered on their site, although this number is sure to grow. They also don’t have Groupons’ advertising budget or enormous customer base, which means much less promotion for the offers on Freevow.

Freevow plan to eventually sell advertising space in premium locations on their site & app to generate revenue, some of which will be used to promote their offers. The also plan on selling listing enhancements, such as featured listings.

The hashtag used #justgettingstarted is accurate, Freevow have only just got started and signed their first business up in late March. Their app (available on Android & IOS) was only published a couple of weeks ago.

Freevow believe that their zero fees approach to providing consumers with deals means they will consistently have better offers than their big name competitors, only time will tell if they are right.