Marketing Research Methods Case 1: Online Couponing

Aashay Doshi

Aisha Ayyakad

BMGT 452

09/11/2012

Case 1

Question 1) The information presented above would be of limited help to a firm like Home Depot. Home Depot is an American retailer of home improvement and construction products and services. It operates many big-box format stores across the United States (including all 50 U.S. states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and Guam), all ten provinces of Canada, Mexico and China. The company is headquartered at the Atlanta Store Support Center in Cobb County, Georgia, in Greater Atlanta. In terms of overall revenue reported to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, the company is the largest home improvement retailer in the United States, ahead of rival Lowe's. Since most of the items sold in Home Depot are in person, using an online strategic couponing strategy may not be the best strategy. In order to maximize satisfaction, Home Depot should regularly issue coupons in retail magazines so that consumers are more attracted to it. Even a nominal ‘10% off’ coupon could enable consumers to save at least $50-$100. In this tight economy, such savings will definitely boost their sales and add new customers. Although Home Depot is not too big on online sales as of now, it is to be noted that Home Depot does employ a couponing strategy today. Websites such as savings.com etc. have coupons which can be redeemed at Home Depot.

Amazon.com is the perfect representative of using an online coupon strategy. Since Amazon is purely an online retailer, consumers are extremely likely to employ coupon codes. According to the abstract above, it is clear that sales are increased with the use of coupons. Hence, it makes perfect business sense for Amazon to employ an effective couponing strategy. It is to be noted that Amazon employs an aggressive strategy in terms of online coupons. Consumers are offered plenty of coupons that can be redeemed for all kind of purchases. However, this extended...