Groupon Is Accused Of Ponzi Scheme &Nbsp; Domestic Group Buying Or Facing Bubble Crisis.

A few days ago, the United States submitted an application for IPO.

Shen Boyang, general manager of glutinous rice net, said that the group buying industry is in a crazy era. Although attracting many capital, the speed of burning money is beyond imagination.

Groupon is in the "hoax"

Jose Ferrara, an American investor, wrote on Friday that unlike JoseFerreira and other emerging social media companies, Groupon did not create value, but created an unstable equilibrium state. Facebook

Its entire operation is like a "Ponzi scheme" and will collapse in 5 years.

Jose Ferrara said that Groupon has discovered that if it can bring new customers to local businesses, it will become a local brand.

Jose Ferrara said, "however, most local businesses are unable to offer more than 10% discount, although some offer a 25% discount, but a 75% discount is a totally unsustainable number.

If all local businesses start to use Groupon, then no one can bring back customers.

This means that with the growth of Groupon, local businesses and their competitors will find that the basic logic of Groupon is no longer established -- Groupon can never bring loyal users to them.

Groupon is also accused of misrepresenting revenue data, and Groupon is worth $50 online.

The dilemma of small group buying network

Now, what is the situation of group buying websites in China?

Opening the first group purchase website "97 regiment" in Shenyang, the website has no longer flourishing. The page says: "the page you requested does not exist".

97 Group founder Zuo Bo Yi told "daily economic news" reporter, because the market atrophy, the competition intensifies, the 97 regiment has already announced the closure.

Last year, the 97 group of Shenyang's first group buying website was launched by Zuo Bo Yi.

However, the joy of entrepreneurial success did not last long, and left Bo Yi found that more and more competitors quickly entered the market.

The popularity of group buying has spread rapidly, and the "thousand regiment war" has been launched throughout the country.

Some group buying websites have introduced the "new play" into the market. "These websites do not do business, but do traffic, lose money and operate with us to snatch users and businesses, and to consumers, where to go cheaper, so that we lose the competitive edge."

Left Bo Yi said.

At the same time, as the entrance threshold is low, some low cost small group purchase websites are also competing.

On the left, the group buying website has now realized the program open source. The new founder only needs to spend 400 yuan to rent the virtual host, and then purchase the domain name at the cost of about 60 yuan per year.

In this regard, Shen Boyang believes that because of the low threshold of group buying websites and the lack of early capital investment, many people blindly go to the market without fully recognizing the market.

At the same time, some of the group buying websites that currently seem to be well funded have been blindly expanding without taking a firm foothold.

Now the group buying market has entered the era of "heavy capital", and some small and medium-sized websites without strong backing will not be able to meet the competitive needs in terms of website content or service quality.

In the Chinese market, the group buying websites that are facing the same predicament as the 97 group are in the minority.

CEO, Zhai Yong, said that at present, 90% of the 82 group buying websites in Shenyang are operating at a loss, and some 3 websites have been closed down. It is expected that a group of small group buying websites will be closed down this year.

According to the latest CNZZ data, the number of visitors to small and medium-sized group buying websites dropped by 20% in May.

At the same time, the number of active sites in the group buying industry last week (with visitor visits) dropped by 8.8% compared with May 1.

Deng Hongfei, a CNZZ data analyst, said that in the group buying industry, because of the huge investment and rapid expansion of the industry leaders, there is tremendous pressure on small and medium sized websites.

Bubble burst crisis

Under the severe market situation, the group buying market has repeatedly exposed the intense competition events, for example, Wo Wo Group collectively excavated the wall from the handle network.

In this regard, Zhai Yong pointed out that the application and innovation of a business mode needs continuous verification and trial process. Because of the huge burn of domestic websites, the rapid expansion speed brings crisis to enterprise management.

"Because too much money is absorbed, it is easy for shareholders to disagree, which delays the decision time of enterprises."

Zhai Yong believes that the dilution of the shareholding of the founding team is likely to cause employee turnover. Because of the existence of a large number of competing enterprises, it is very easy for employees to change jobs.

At the same time, the unified management of sites across the country has also become a challenge. A large number of complex financial audits have dragged back the expansion, while some websites have repeatedly been criticized for after-sale services.

"According to the general practice of large group buying website, the product is sold first and then paid again. When the website first pays the business, it will first withhold 20% of the money for after-sale service.

However, due to the excessive expansion of some websites, it is impossible to guarantee the quality of service for the customers to take advantage of the mode of cooperation after first padding money, which will lead to an increase in customer complaints and adverse effects in the market.

Zhai said.

Public figures show that 12 of the 30 major VC projects in the e-commerce field last year were invested in group buying websites.

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Shen Boyang said the group buying industry is in a crazy era. Although attracting a lot of capital, the speed of burning money is beyond imagination.

At present, the average gross profit margin of the group buying industry is 8%~10% per unit, but these revenues are only a drop in the bucket for the fast burning website.

This year's marketing expenses announced by major group buying network show that the advertising budget of the US group network is 130 million yuan, and the glutinous rice network plan is 200 million advertising.

Chen Shou Shou, an international analyst at Analysys International, said that at present, many capital buying group websites are building brands. Under such a market trend of "leftover", the bubble will be bigger and bigger.

Some websites have invested a lot of capital in advertising marketing to pave the way for listing, but the cash flow has obvious problems. Once the capital chain is broken, there will be a change in property rights or even bankruptcy.