THE boss of rapidly-growing daily deals provider itison insisted last week that the offers culture was a force for good for the Scottish hospitality industry.
Dada PR boss Oli Norman launched itison in September 2010 and it became an almost instant success. Turning over £10 million in its second year, its 300,000 members (and counting) are emailed daily deals on a range of experiences and services.
Norman, who claims to have invested £1 million in developing the company’s infrastructure, told SLTN that deals offered through itison have generated an additional £60,000-£70,000 in revenue for businesses over a three-month period.
But he warned that certain key principles should be followed for deals to be successful for all parties concerned, explaining that a “12-check programme”, covering issues like “price point validity”, is carried out before deals go live. And while he conceded the selling techniques practised by some deals companies had given the market “a bad rap”, he said the culture was here to stay.
“There’s no doubt a lot of operators who have not run a deal think it’s a dirty word, but when they understand how to structure it and have a good experience it becomes an important sales and marketing strategy,” he told SLTN.
Operating in Glasgow, Aberdeen, Dundee and Edinburgh, itison’s clients include Blythswood Square and Rogano in Glasgow.
