Hello local shoppers

It's 2011 now and there is a lot in the works for us here at local-shoppers.com.  But before I get into that, I want to personally thank each and everyone of you for all of your support over the past year.  2010 was a great year for us as we totaled over 4,000,000 hits to this site!  That's over one and a half million more than we had last year and more than 10 times the amount we had in 2008.  So, from all of us here at local-shoppers.com, thank you for being local-shoppers!

Now for the new stuff.  This is going to be a really exciting year as we have a lot of new features coming to the site.  First off, we are going to be changing how the coupon feature works.  As it is now, anyone can go and print a coupon from the site from any business that has one attached to their ad.  This is good, however, the quality of the coupons become somewhat generic.  So we are going to change that.  We are going to call the "coupons" section our "local deals" section now.  Each advertiser is going to have the opportunity to create an amazing discount and actually limit how many of them are available.  For instance, rather than a restaurant offering an unlimited amount of 10% off coupons, they are going to be able to offer a 50% off your bill to the first 20 people that print it off.  Now in order to redeem your deal, you will have to first post it to your facebook wall for all to see.  You will then be able to redeem it.  What this does is create a sense of urgency so the deals are flying off the site.  This will also create better discounts and more advertisers participating and updating their discounts.

We will also be initiating a geo-zip feature.  What this means, is that you will be able to go to our home page and enter in your zipcode.  You will then see ads and deals relevant to your area.  This is a very nice feature and should make finding businesses in your area even easier than it is now.  We are saying good bye to our classifieds section as well.  Most of you already either go to craigslist or ebay classifieds for this and we want our focus to be on the local businesses in your community.

Give aways, give aways, give aways!  We are going to be giving away more local gift certificates than ever this year.  In fact, it's our goal to give away $1000 in local gift certificates away every month!  All you have to do is add us on facebook to get in on the action.  Stay tuned for the announcement of our next give away date.

Finally, we are franchising out.  Yes, that's right.  Now for a minimal fee, you can own your own local-shoppers franchise.  You will have control over an entire region, including your very own dashboard for site control.  Franchises will be available in all 50 states.  This is an extremely good income opportunity and you will be doing something positive for your community.  Work from home or out of your own office.  This is a great opportunity for a husband and wife who would like to work together as my wife and I do.  If you are interested in becoming a franchisee, please contact us at staff@local-shoppers.com.  Serious inquiries only please.

Thanks again for all of your support.  We need it this year to.  You can help by leaving reviews for your favorite businesses.  Word of mouth is still the best form of advertising and other local shoppers trust your opinions more than the ads themselves.  Keep shopping local and tell your friends and family about us!