CountOff, a new National Daily Deals Site, to Launch May 2

CountOff shifts the focus away from confined local discount offers to large-scale customer acquisition for nationwide merchants

CountOff, the new daily discount website for national merchants, today announced the upcoming launch of CountOff.com, the company’s social ecommerce network.  Scheduled to launch May 2, 2011, CountOff brings a fresh approach to the ‘daily deal’ format by shifting the focus away from discounts confined to local businesses in individual cities to leading national retailers and brands.

Partnering with major brands such as NASCAR Racing Experience, as well as boutique sites, CountOff offers customers highly customizable and brand-orientated landing pages.  When visitors log on to CountOff, they will see the CountOff promotions (CountOffers) offering consumers 50-plus percent discounts to both merchant websites and national retail locations.  Page design takes on the look and feel of the merchant’s own site to best promote and showcase the most popular items selected by the retailers.

“When we began the concept of CountOff, we saw that national retailers were getting left behind from the daily deal phenomenon,” said Michael Goldstein, president of CountOff. “We wanted to be a champion for the national retailers who have previously not been able to integrate themselves into the discount sales model. CountOff spotlights and promotes the merchant’s brand to ensure they obtain the highest return and greatest customer retention possible.”

(sample CountOff page)

“NASCAR Racing Experience has had previous success at the local level with daily deals,” said Heather Lutz for NASCAR Racing Experience.  “CountOff allows us to take our previous local success and offer it directly to our national audience with a broad, nationwide campaign.  As NASCAR Racing Experience continues to expand its audience, we look forward to offering this exciting opportunity to a new fan base.”

With CountOff, merchants are able generate their own redemption codes for customers who purchase CountOffers - the redemption process works with the merchants pre-existing systems. This approach allows merchants to directly increase their own customer retention rates with low acquisition costs. 

With zero initial investment from merchants, CountOff allows merchants to keep 75 percent of deal revenue – significantly higher than companies that focus on local markets. For more information, visit www.CountOff.com.

San Diego’s NewBlue Inc. joins EvoNexus to launch Vibop mobile video sharing platform

NewBlue, Inc., a growing provider of integrated video effects technologies, and CommNexus, a nonprofit technology industry association that works to accelerate the success of the technology industry in the region, today announces that NewBlue has been accepted into EvoNexus™, San Diego’s only community-supported, fully pro-bono technology incubator.

Founded by proven, experienced entrepreneurs in digital media, NewBlue was created on the premise that video would become an integral part of popular culture and a critical player in the consumer marketplace. EvoNexus will support NewBlue on expanding market availability of Vibop, its upcoming patent pending, cloud-based technology that enables social networking with video across mobile devices and smartphones. Vibop is based on NewBlue’s extensive and proprietary library of NewBlueFX video filters.

“EvoNexus is the perfect place to take NewBlue to the next level. San Diego boasts some of the finest cellular and mobile back-end technologies in the country,” said Melissa Jordan Grey, co-founder and chief creative officer for NewBlue, Inc.  “With the introduction of Vibop, we leverage this city’s strong mobile foundations with a powerful front-end.”  

EvoNexus and its sponsors will be providing NewBlue with project mentoring and consulting, access to senior executives, help with fundraising, graphic design and printing services and other forms of cost reduction.  Previously operating as a virtual enterprise, NewBlue will now be centralizing its staff and developing in San Diego, having moved into office space provided by EvoNexus at beginning of April 2011.  

“NewBlue has established itself as a premier provider of video special effects and editing software with the success of NewBlueFX,” said Kevin Hell, chairman of EvoNexus. “This excellent foundation serves as a great springboard for its upcoming expansion into the consumer video sharing marketplace via Vibop. At EvoNexus, our goal is to support NewBlue in any way possible, ranging from the use of our sponsor’s facilities and services to mentoring, oversight and events.”  

“Our association with EvoNexus elevates NewBlue’s access to industry leaders. And with their support and infrastructure, we enter an exciting growth stage. This includes the process of finding outstanding local talent in San Diego, which we are proud to say, has already begun,” added Todor Fay, co-founder and chief technology officer for NewBlue, Inc.

Vibop mobile video editing and social sharing technology will be available for mobile devices and smartphones in the second quarter, 2011.  For more information, please visit www.newblueinc.com or shoot me an email - rmanning@myntpr.com