Social Network for Business Promotions and Discount Offers

QBurst designed and developed a web application for our client, which allows traders to create their own profiles and display their offers and promotions. Shoppers can use the web application to search for discounts using various criteria. A mobile applications was also developed across all popular platforms for shoppers to search and redeem discount coupons. We used JSP Servlets to build the web application and native SDKs to develop mobile applications.

Our client wanted to create an online marketplace that showcases discounts and promotions announced by businesses.

• The online marketplace would enable businesses to register and publish discounts, while buyers look for the best prices on products they intend to purchase.
• Buyers can search and get a list of all discounts and offers available for a product without subscribing to individual websites.

Even though this business model already existed in the market, our client wanted to get a step ahead by providing the service free of cost to customers and businesses.

We developed a web application for business owners to display their promotions and offers along with a mobile application for buyers to search for offers and discount coupons.

• • Web Application:
  • Displays discounts based on latitude and longitude values, except for national discounts that are not location based.
  • Handles complex queries and performs search based on vendor title, city, state, area code, and zip code.
  • Has three user groups/logins — Business Owner, Consumer, and Administrator.
  • Automatically identifies the user and group upon login, and presents the list of functions that can be performed by the user group.
  • Business owner
  • Create a profile for their business.
  • Enter discount details such as expiry date, category, local or national.
  • Enter and verify address displayed in Google Maps API.
  • Renew discounts by the expiration date, failing which the discounts are removed from search results.
  • Consumer
  • Search and view discounts in the directory.
  • Redeem discounts/coupons by using the printed copy in stores.
  • Review discounts and share them in social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter.
  • Administrator
  • Manage all business owner and consumer accounts; delete or ban users.
  • Verify and manage discounts and locations of businesses.
  • Manage discount categories and tag discounts to be displayed as ads.
  • Verify consumer reviews on discounts.
  • Receive email notifications for new discounts and business profiles.
• • Mobile Application:
  • App is built for iPhone , Android, BlackBerry, and Windows Phone.
  • Shoppers can avail discounts and redeem coupons.
  • When launched, the application automatically detects the physical location of the user and displays discounts and offers at the nearest location.
  • Discounts are categorized based on verticals.
  • Consumers can search for discounts using vendor name, city, state, area code, or zip code, and redeem them at stores.
  • Maps provide directions for the consumer to reach the business store.
  • Shoppers can submit reviews.

QBurst developed the web application using JSP Servlets with Apache Tomcat as web server and MySQL as database. Complexities in search functions were implemented using SQL queries. Automatic generation of latitude and longitude values when users type the address of their business location was accomplished with the help of Google Maps API.

The web application provides API for all mobile applications with OAuth for authorization. Data is hosted in the client’s emotion server. We developed the mobile applications using native SDKs.

The client initially designed a user interface for the web application, which we felt conflicted with the UX standards and could demote the product. So we modified the user interface design. We also changed the original architecture developed by our client to sort out technical and backend complications.

The success of the product greatly depended on the search functionality, which is one of the most important features in the product. We incorporated complex SQL queries and created efficient search functions for the application.

• CSRF middleware for XSS attack prevention
• Redis session store integration for effective session handling
• Performance based NoSQL design
• Internationalization and localized date support
• Integrated logging with different levels
• Secure server support
• Reusable presentation logic maintained with View Helpers
• Custom migration framework to load fixtures and adapt database to schema changes

• iOS
  • iOS SDK
  • Google Maps
  • ShareKit
  • Facebook Standard Library
• Android
  • Android SDK
  • Google Maps
  • Facebook Standard Library
  • Twitter API

• Windows Phone
  • Windows Phone SDK
  • Bing Maps
  • Facebook & Twitter APIs
• BlackBerry
  • BlackBerry NDK
  • Blackberry Maps
  • Facebook & Twitter APIs

• The web application went live soon after development and the mobile applications were published in app stores.
• We realized our client’s vision, and they became the first free discount social network in the U.S.