Mobstreet.in

Finally, landed into a slightly different group discounting site - mobstreet.in !! Unlike other group discount web sites, this one offers two types of discounts - Open deals and Mob deals. While the Open deals become active as soon as they are being published, the Mob deals turn active only when there are a minimum number of users who sign up for the deal. Probably, that's one of the reason you can see the deal categories different from the one's that i have been seeing on earlier sites. The focus appears be more on electronic gadgets and tours/travels. I did not notice any restruant or health club related offers (some relief to increasingly confused users!!) Interestingly, I could see offers on air tickets which was quite a deviation from local services. You can get latest deals on mobile or by email.
The buy workflow involves charging the customer a small amount as an advance. The pending balance amount needs to be paid to the vendor after deducting the advance payment. Not sure which cities are current being covered by this site !! Check it out here if you wanna experience it.

Mydala

I had a chance to look at mydala.com - another group discount web site. The process and approach remains the same. Each day the web site publishes a deal at 12 PM. The deal remains valid for 24 to 72 hours. A customer can buy the deal at the announced group discounted price. Each deal becomes valid only if a minimum number of people have signed up for it. Once the deal is closed and it has achieved the required number of people the customer receives a printed discount voucher in his email box. The validity of each deal depends upon the vendor's offer and is published clearly on the web site under "What the catch" section.

There are multiple payment options - by cash, credit card, netbanking, IVR, oxicash etc which makes the payment easy for customers. I could see the following retail segments leveraging this as a medium for sales promotion:
1. Restaurants
2. Slimming and beauty services
3. Tours and travels
4. Movie theaters
5. Shoes and bags

Currently, if offers this service in Bangalore, Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Pune, Hyderabad, Chandigarah and chennai. You can get the latest deals on your phone or email. Give it a try, click here.