Daily deals site Zoupon has paid over $100,000 for the Deals.com.au domain in a move the company hopes will bring in more traffic and push the site higher in search engine rankings.
The huge purchase – one of the largest among the Australian domain name market – comes as Zoupon faces competition from the ever growing group buying industry, which all use variations on the phrase “daily deals”.
Jeremy Same, Zoupon managing director, says the company was willing to pay the price due to the SEO benefits.
“We think it’s a valuable domain name and we think it’s going to help elevate us in people’s eyes, and they’ll go for the deals. When people are searching for deals on Google, hopefully this means they will find us.”
Same would not reveal who Zoupon had bought the domain name from. However, he revealed the entire site will now come under the Deals.com.au brand as of Monday next week, and the Zoupon name will be retired.
“Basically, Zoupon will continue to be live until Monday, after which time traffic will be redirected. The new site will be live from Monday, and the first deal to come out from Deals.com.au will happen then.”
Same says the branding opportunities under the new name are much greater than operating under the Zoupon name.
“It’s the same service, we’re just changing the name. But we think this will elevate us to match the big boys in the market.”
“SEO is the major reason, but in terms of our branding there is no better way to describe the industry that we are in other than ‘deals’”.
Same says the company will also continue to roll out more deals and improve its services in the hope of competing with the larger players in the market, such as Catch of the Day.
“We’re constantly making improvements to the site, we’re going to be rolling out more deals and we’re going to be putting the name out there and providing more awareness of our company.”
Patrick Stafford is a freelance journalist and a former deputy editor of SmartCompany.
