‘MetroMix Deals’ Launches; Mixes Deals, Offers With City Guide Content

The future of city guides has been morphing beyond events and features. This was driven home today by the launch of Metromix Deals, a JV between Metromix, the 50+ site city guide chain co-owned by Gannett and Tribune, and Local Offer Network, which separately operates Deal Radar.

The effort is the latest “aggregator” to bundle deal a days with other offers and content. Other major aggregators include The Dealmap, 8coupons and Yipit.

Metromix Deals, which also includes deals from FindMeSpecials.com, specifically aims to target consumers with deals when they are ready to buy (i.e., as they are planning a movie date). There is a dedicated deals section on the site, as well as deals-related features in contextually relevant areas (akin to Tippr and some others). Consumers can search deals by city, neighborhood or category; view the day’s top deals on a map; and plan ahead via a Metromix Deals calendar.

“Our audience has always looked to us for information on local deals, so the new Metromix Deals destination is the natural extension of our ever-growing site,” said Kara Walsh, Metromix CEO, in a press release.

Advertisers can gain additional impact beyond typical featured listings by taking over the Deals section home page and other areas and “re-skinning” them with their brand images and roadblocking the ad units. They will also get extra mileage by having their ads distributed to other Local Offer Network sites. Local Offer Network, which envisions deals with other publishers, is headed by former Tribune Interactive exec Dan Hess.