Can You Build A Site Like Groupon With WordPress?

Daily deals, bundles, discount codes, coupons and group buying sites are all huge. Hugely profitable, hugely popular, and, you would think, hugely complicated.

Groupon and sites like it need developers and all the time and money that comes with that. So even if you have a great idea for a site like Groupon you might be put off from trying to get it started.

In a Quora discussion it was estimated that it would cost from $3000 to $15,000 to build a site like Groupon. There are clone themes on sale for a thousand dollars.

However, using WordPress themes like Groupon you can build a powerful, professional site with just a regular WordPress install. No need for coding or developer expenses. You can set up and maintain the site yourself.

If you think WordPress is just about blogging think again, and check out our list of 12 WordPress Themes That Look Nothing Like Blogs.

In How to Grow Your Own Zomato With This WordPress Theme we looked at how you can make a Zomato-style website with WordPress. And now we are about to do the same, looking at WordPress themes like Groupon and how you can start your own deals site.

WordPress themes like Groupon

There are WordPress themes like Groupon that will help you get started. It’s also important to think about the function, not just the form of your new site.

WPGroupbuy is a premium theme for a daily deals style site. Have a look at the showcase and examples of sites that have been built. They cover all sorts of designs and all sorts of niches and will give you plenty of inspiration for your Groupon-style website.

Features of the theme include plenty of management tools for adding and organising deals, accounts, payment gateways and seventeen pre-made templates to get you up and running quickly.

Couponia is another theme for taking on Groupon. Take the demo for a test drive and see some of the great theme templates. Large countdown clocks and big images look great and draw visitors in with scarcity.

Couponia looks slick with image effects, sliders, lightbox images, parallax backgrounds and animations. Each element comes with lots of options to play around with.

Using deals as a business model

It’s not just Groupon that has built a business around daily deals, coupons and bundles.

The latest Humble Bundle has over 45,000 purchases at the time of writing. AppSumo is daily deals for the entrepreneur. Product Hunt can make or break a startups success.

So while you might want a WordPress theme like Groupon to run your Groupon clone, remember that others have tried and failed to build on Groupon’s success – even Amazon.

The concept of a deals website is a great one. But you will need a fresh take and a closer niche to make it work.

You can shortcut your success and build a site like Groupon with the Plugin Hunt theme.

Groupon means you have to build relationships with businesses and negotiate deals. But if you can get the users in place first, hunting their own deals, you have leverage. Then, like ProductHunt, people are clamouring to get on your site.

WordPress themes like Groupon: Plugin Hunt

Plugin Hunt is a theme that gives you all the functions of Groupon with a fresh new take. Seed deals or let your users find them. You can run promotions and sales, share revenues or take an affiliate commission. Curate collections of the best, most interesting deals and show all the trending deals that the community has found.

Users register for an account – which also gives you a powerful email list, like Groupon. They can easily submit their own finds, vote and leave comments. There are powerful backend features for you to manage your site with the help of a few plugins.

Interested? Find out more:

• How to build a Product Hunt clone with WordPress
• 3 ways to use the Plugin Hunt theme to make your website shine
• How to make money with niche WordPress themes

You will be well on your way to making your very own deals site, just like Groupon.

There’s also a booming business in curating daily deals from websites like Groupon. Because there are so many potential sites and great deals people worry about missing out. Sites like Yipit aggregate all those daily deals.

Could you do the same for your industry, niche, or location? You could still use a WordPress theme like Groupon that we discussed here but act as a one stop shop for all the different Groupon-style sites. Revenue can come from affiliate commissions or advertising without all the work of setting up the deals.

Daily deals sites like Groupon are a great way to make money online. Using WordPress themes like Groupon from this article you can get up and running quickly and easily with nowhere near the cost you would think.

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