Google Buys Local Deals Aggregator "The Dealmap"

Google has made another big move in the fast-growing local deals space by purchasing The Dealmap. Company insiders say they were impressed with the things Dealmap has accomplished in a little over a year since being launched. The acquisition should enhance Google's other local deals offerings, such as the recently-launched Google Offers product.

The local daily deals business is exploding, with over 400 different online companies vying for market share. The industry is expected to generate over $6 billion in yearly gross revenue by 2015. Groupon and LivingSocial are still the biggest players but Google, Facebook, and other deep-pocketed web companies are getting into the game at a rapid pace.

The Dealmap is basically an aggregator service that pulls together current local deal offerings from several different websites. It currently has over 2 million users and its mobile app has been downloaded over a million times. It will be interesting to see how Google integrates Dealmap's platform into their own local deals offerings.

Learn some mo': Google buys daily deal aggregator The Dealmap

Facebook Deals: Coming to a City Near You!

Facebook has jumped headfirst into the "local deals" game by launching Facebook Deals, a new competitor to Groupon and LivingSocial. Users in Austin, San Diego, San Francisco, Atlanta, and Dallas will be able to find discounts and coupons for local services and stores and the company plans to expand the service to many more cities within the next few months.

Facebook will tap into its more than 600 million users to establish itself in a business that has turned into a multi-billion dollar industry. Experts believe that more competition in the local deals business should lead to better and better offers to end-users.

Facebook can leverage its social networking strengths in a way that makes them the leader in "social deals" online. They say they will focus on local offers that involve social activities, such as those related to dining, fitness, and outdoor activities. So you'll be able to suggest cool deals and also invite friends and family to take part in a local offer.

According Emily White, Facebook Local Director:

"We're building a product that is social from the ground up... All of these deals are things you want to do with friends, so no teeth whitening, but yes to river rafting."

We say: this is great! The more local deals we can get our hands on here in Las Vegas the better (this is an expensive city!)...

Learn some mo': Facebook Launches Deals to Compete With Groupon

Google Launches Local Deals Product "Offers"

People love getting great local deals in their city or town, which is why Google made an aggressive push to buy Groupon just a couple of months ago. Well that didnt' work out (apparently $6 billion doesn't get you much these days) so now Google has launched its own alternative to Groupon and LivingSocial: Google Offers.

Actually the new service is in "pre-launch", with Google calling it a test of a new pre-paid offers/deal vouchers program. They haven't said much more but some search engine whizzes out there found out that by putting the following search string into Google's main search you can see thousands of backdoor "Offers" results:

coupons site:maps.google.com intitle:Google Offers

You can narrow the search down by putting your city in the search string as well, like this:

los angeles coupons site:maps.google.com intitle:Google Offers

Just a few minutes of surfing the results of that string showed us lots of great LA-based local deals. Even a search for Las Vegas deals (our home city) showed a couple hundred interesting results. What's really cool, and the thing that may end up giving Google and edge over competitors, is that you can add a Google Offers gadget to your home page to find up-to-the-minute deals for your home town.

So what do you think? Will this new local deals service take off and beat out Groupon and LivingSocial? Or do you think it'll be another Google flop? Leave your opinions and feedback below!

Learn some mo': Google Offers: Google's Groupon challenger is being tested