DealMaadi - shopping deals the Digg way

DealMaadi is an alternative, experimental approach by Rajiv to apply the popular, Digg like community voting method to shopping deals. Users submit shopping deals, vote for the ones they find interesting and the deals which get greater votes sift to the top. This makes it easy for others to discover other ‘hot’ shopping deals.
The site is based on Pligg - an open source clone of Digg. At first glance, it seems that applying the community voting method to shopping deals would be a great idea - the most popular deals would automatically sift to the top and not-so-popular ones will get buried into obscurity. However, the biggest hindrance to adoption will be in building a strong user community. The meteoric rise of Digg is courtesy of its rabid user community. For DealMaadi to be successful, they’ll have to build a strong, enthusiastic community who not only vote for deals but also submit new deals.
The site uses a default template bundled with Pligg and considering that this is a proof of concept, the design serves the purpose. Rajiv’s future plans with the site depend on the kind of response he gets.

I wish Rajiv the best with his efforts - hopefully, the site gets enough traction and he’s able to monetize the effort.

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4 Responses to “DealMaadi - shopping deals the Digg way”

1. go2indiaweb20.com » Deal Maadi - will it be a success? on June 12th, 2007 9:28 pm

   [...] I read this article from Startup Dunia about Deal Maadi (click here for the article), a Dig like community voting method for shopping deals. I agree with the story that the success of this startup depend on building a strong community who not only vote on deals but also submit new deals. [...]

2. Vicky on June 13th, 2007 3:51 am

   Bringing digg voting system to deals is quiet a good concept. There are a number of successful sites in US and UK based on this concept. hotukdeals.com is quiet successful in uk and so is dealigg.com in US. Implementing it for indian users is a step in right direction.

   But I would avoid saying that its a “digg clone”. Clone refers to being a copy. Though dealmadi employs voting method similar to digg but serves different audience.

   I do accept that user voting method to highlight articles was pioneered by digg but do we say Gmail is a clone of Hotmail ? I consider digg voting method as a concept which can be bring out valuable information hidden in vast amount of internet sites.

   Pranav, thanks for reviewing indian startups, I’m sure it will go along way in promoting entrepreneurship in Indian society.

   - Vicky
   http://www.startupnews.in
   [ news for entrepreneurs ]

3. Rajiv Renganathan on June 15th, 2007 4:17 pm

   Hi Pranav,

   Thanks for writing. You rightly pointed out that the building of a community is the key.

   Though DealMaadi’s design is based on the pligg template, it is not simply the base template.

   Cheers!
   Rajiv

4. Mrugesh on November 2nd, 2007 7:30 am

   Great Interview by Loscreador.com. To make hay while the sun shines, shoppers need to be smart to search and make the right purchase in the right place at the right time…….Read more At http://www.loscreador.com/web2interviews/dealmaadi