Coupon Mom. The Krazy Coupon Lady. Hip2Save. You’ve likely visited or at least heard of them, since they’re among the most prominent and popular blogs devoted to coupons and deals. But they’re far from the only ones. Just pick a store, or a region of the country, and there’s bound to be a blog or twelve devoted to couponing in your area and at your favorite store.
Critics may dismiss them all as “Mommy blogs”, a modern-day version of a coffee klatch where bloggers and readers gossip, talk about their kids and chat about coupons and shopping. But a new survey is suggesting just how influential these blogs can be.
The survey from Womensforum.com aimed to find out where women get their coupons and what they use them for. The news release announcing the findings focused largely on the continued importance and influence of coupons, headlining the fact that 89% of respondents said they’re regularly influenced by coupons to try new grocery products.
But tucked toward the end of the survey were the intriguing responses to the question, “How do you find coupons for food/drink products you buy at the supermarket?” Unsurprisingly, newspapers, magazines and supermarket circulars topped the list. But 37.8% cited “Food or frugal-focused website/bloggers that share coupons.”
If the results of this survey of some 2,200 moms could be extrapolated to the general population, that would mean more than one-third of the millions and millions of shoppers who use coupons, rely on coupon bloggers to help plan their shopping trips. That’s a lot of coupon blog followers. No wonder there are so many coupon blogs.
Many of the most well-established coupon bloggers have been doing it for years, though the extreme couponing craze of a few years ago caused the entire category to explode in popularity. The TLC network TV show “Extreme Couponing” regularly featured shoppers who were portrayed as “average moms”, without disclosing the fact that many of them ran their own coupon blogs and were far from amateurs. The debut episode, for example, featured the dumpster-diving Joanie who, unbeknownst to most viewers at the time, was actually “The Krazy Coupon Lady.” And one of the very last episodes featured Susan and her “coupon organizing robot“, without mentioning the fact that the “robot” aids in the coupon clipping service that she’s run for decades as the “Coupon Queen”.
With everyone wanting to get in on the deals and enjoy the same coupon savings as the “average moms” featured on TV, various how-to coupon sites and blogs that share the newest coupons experienced a surge of interest. Even now that extreme couponing has faded in popularity, there are still hundreds of coupon blogs out there to choose from.
Other insights offered up by the Womensforum.com survey include the fact that 55.1% of respondents say they get coupons from online ads, including those appearing on blogs, and 28.9% get them via social media. “Moms are tapping into a variety of sources in order to discover the latest and greatest products to put in their supermarket carts,” said Mark Kaufman, Womensforum.com founder and CEO. “The power of the coupon hasn’t faded in the digital era, but has taken on new life, as women search for savings across a range of channels.”
Of course, considering the survey participants are regular visitors to an online forum geared toward women, they may well be predisposed to seeking out deals offered up online by – typically – other women. But for a category that barely existed in the pre-extreme couponing era, the Womensforum.com survey suggests that coupon blogs – at least the better ones – are here to stay.
Sadly, both of my favorite coupon/savings bloggers ‘retired’ their daily blogs last Summer. Because of that, I have been couponing much less.
As to sources? I get my coupons from wherever the Mfgrs offer them.
But lately the newspaper is less and less of a source for me.
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