For the local business owner, Groupon appears to be a dream come true. The platform allows the small business owner to short circuit the traditional means of acquiring new customers — offering consumers promotional price discounts in place of the grassroots marketing and word of mouth that actually builds something durable.
What small business owners soon realize is that the increase in demand is short lived. Consumers only value the price discount — not the product or service the company is selling. This is not a sustainable, long term way to build and grow a business. It is a shortcut. A shortcut around doing the hard work that it takes to build a product or service that speaks for itself.
We, as individuals, have been impacted in a similar way by this Groupon Illusion. Our current culture thrives on the idea of the life hack — self-help books and power poses. Shortcuts intended to help us get the results we seek with less time and effort than it would have otherwise taken. However, as with the small business owner, there are no shortcuts to living the life you intend to lead or being the person you aspire to be. Sustainable improvement comes from work. It comes from the investment of time, energy and resources to be better.
Let’s unsubscribe from Groupon and embrace the “long cut” — investing the time and energy to build the change we want to see in the world.