>...I'd wager most small businesses have no way of tracking the marketing impact of a Groupon (i.e. how many people come from 2nd visits or word of mouth from G

>...I'd wager most small businesses have no way of tracking the marketing impact of a Groupon (i.e. how many people come from 2nd visits or word of mouth from Grouponers).... Aren't there ways to solve this; e.g. change the name/sku/price/etc of the item you are selling through a groupon. When it gets bought, referred to, asked for etc via the new tag-info you can relate it to the groupon? IANA sales/retailer etc... but I can imagine that you could figure this out. --- On another note; My friend owns a successful cup-cake shop in SF, groupon was asking them to sell what was typically a $36 box of cupcakes for $15 -- and then asking for 50% of the $15. So effectively sell the cupcakes for 25% of what they typically retail for. That just sounds like BS. -- however, as another HNer wrote earlier in this thread- this model works really well for things such as fitness - where your product is effectively just the groupon-buyer's attendance. I was talking with some people the other day and they said they bought some work-out boot-camp deal that was retailing for $600, for $200 and that was a good deal. I agree that it is a good deal - but it also proves to me that the $600 price point is way to freaking high...