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PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B

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Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B

#181

Post by zten »

patd wrote: post #123
zten wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They do care. Some affiliate rates are far higher than that. Affiliate comes out of retailer marketing budgets. They set the rates thinking they're paying for certain types of customers from certain participants. Honey is getting paid what the retailers think it's worth - they're skeptical, but it seems to be driving incremental conversion for especially price-sensitive shoppers.

Coupons affiliates typically get a lower rev share than others. It may be cheaper for retailers to have them if they don’t care about pissing off their others affiliates (most are too small to get their voice heard)

I think we're in agreement. The numbers through Honey probably look good, and the other affiliates probably don't have a good handle on how frequently they're getting scooped by other affiliates.

Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B

#182

Post by gamblor956 »

geitir wrote: post #162
gamblor956 wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honey isn't inserting themselves between the blogger and the seller automatically. The user is doing that when they use the Honey add-on after visiting the blogger's website. This is no different then a user visiting a different website about the same product and clicking through the affiliate link on that new blogger's page before making the purchase.

Do you work for them? It sounds like you work for them. Based on your description, the crux of it is they exactly do insert themselves between a blog / affiliate link and their incentivization towards a specific seller exactly does replace whatever commission the blog would have seen

I don't work for them, nor do I know any of their employees.

However, I have used their add-on and it does not work the way you described.

Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B

#183

Post by gamblor956 »

deelowe wrote: post #168
geitir wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you work for them? It sounds like you work for them. Based on your description, the crux of it is they exactly do insert themselves between a blog / affiliate link and their incentivization towards a specific seller exactly does replace whatever commission the blog would have seen

Agreed. The parent is coming across as obtuse to the point where I wonder if it's intentional.

It sounds a lot like the two of you work for one of Honey's competitors. You both are coming across as obtuse to the point where I wonder if it's intentional.

Oh wait, you say you're just a guy on the internet and you don't work for anyone in the industry? Yeah, pal, same here. The difference is that I base my comments on having used Honey as a customer, not on some random comment based on a random comment by someone who hasn't actually used the product we're all talking about it.

It's fine if you guys want talk out of your rears but at least be honest about what you're doing.

Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B

#184

Post by 55555 »

mmanfrin wrote: post #179
55555 wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, you can note that, and that's helpful, but other than in the strict legal sense, many coupon code sites do engage in other forms of coupon stuffing. For example, many display fake coupons which don't exist or which they know are expired, and which you must click to reveal. Upon clicking, the target site opens in a new window, and a cookie is dropped. The user was already buying the product anyway, and perhaps a…

That's not cookie stuffing, that's just being deceptive. Cookie stuffing doesnt just mean sending a user to an affiliate link, it means specifically loading unrelated sites, usually in the background (or used with js/flash). I'm noting it because you're using the wrong term. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cookie_stuffing

I disagree that there is a monopoly on the term. But even if we accept that, my example meets the requirements of the page you linked. Read it more carefully.

Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B

#185

Post by sieabahlpark »

squeaky-clean wrote: post #143
tzs wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What they claim on their "About" page [1] is: > Our Business Model > We earn a commission from stores when you find savings. What we don't do is sell or share your data (you can read our Privacy Policy here) > We're building a better way to shop, one that saves you time and money, even if there's less in it for us. If this sounds like a new way of doing things, you're right. [1] https://www.joinhoney.com/about

They're very specific about the actual meaning of "your data". By any basic understanding of "selling your data", Honey does exactly that. > We may also share information in the following cases > with your express consent > in an aggregate or anonymized format that does not identify any specific person; These cases are ORs, not ANDs. Whenever any company sells your personal info, it's always anonymized and aggregated…

You can just not use the service or delete your data. It's a CA company that by law must abide by CCPA so you know your data is deleted except for regulatory purposes

Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B

#186

Post by [deleted] »

_1qd4 wrote: post #177
shamblesRed wrote: post #90

Feel like a lot of people don't understand what business Honey is in. And a lot of the times they're not even familiar with the whole lineup of Honey products. Knowing someone's intent to purchase is very powerful. You're literally giving information about what you want to buy, what price you might buy at etc. Plus deals, coupons, price drops etc make manipulation really easy. $4B might be a bit too much but still, t…

You don't understand how fickle technology is and how fickle users are. It's a browser plugin, it takes 2 seconds to uninstall. This entire company could disappear in a flash if something about the plugin ecosystem changes, or if e-commerce habits change to be more mobile oriented. They have absolutely 0 stickiness. Most of their users probably installed the plugin during their initial marketing push and have forgott…

[deleted]

Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B

#187

Post by joking »

IanCal wrote: post #171
dillonmckay wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do they (Honey) know, though?

It's a browser extension.

Ok, I get how they do technically, but how the shops let honey insert they affiliate id and take a cut when the user has come directly from a newsletter?

Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B

#188

Post by CydeWeys »

shamblesRed wrote: post #131
CydeWeys wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're paying for the large existing userbase, regardless of how that large userbase was acquired.

Sure! But just 17 million user by itself isn't worth $4 billion. It's the value brought in per user. There's no figuring out what you want and what are your interests like with social media platforms, it's straight forward giving away info about what you want to buy, what will make you buy it etc. Just look at Honey Droplist https://www.joinhoney.com/features/droplist . Let's say that I wanted to buy a product but I…

Are you sure it's not worth that much? That's only $235 per user. Given how affiliate revenue can easily approach 10%, and their average user probably spends thousands of dollars online per year, it seems easily within the bounds of reason to me.

Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B

#189

Post by strbean »

viraptor wrote: post #130
strbean wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are EBates, without the cash back. They just auto-plug coupons into coupon code forms and take the referral money.

Technically without the cashback. In practice you still connect honey gold which converts into vouchers, so it's really like 1-2% cashback.

Interesting, didn't know about that aspect of Honey!

tbh, my experience with EBates (and promo codes in general) is that retailers hardly run promo codes anymore. It seems most codes now are individualized, probably as a reaction to the adoption of tools like these.

Re: PayPal to acquire shopping and rewards platform Honey for $4B

#190

Post by squeaky-clean »

sieabahlpark wrote: post #185
squeaky-clean wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're very specific about the actual meaning of "your data". By any basic understanding of "selling your data", Honey does exactly that. > We may also share information in the following cases > with your express consent > in an aggregate or anonymized format that does not identify any specific person; These cases are ORs, not ANDs. Whenever any company sells your personal info, it's always anonymized and aggregated…

You can just not use the service or delete your data. It's a CA company that by law must abide by CCPA so you know your data is deleted except for regulatory purposes

I don't use the service, and for the reasons I mentioned in my comment. But saying they do not sell your data because some non legally binding webpage says so is not true and that is the point of my comment.
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