Valassis Expands Social Reach with New Couponing App on the Facebook Platform

LIVONIA, Mich., July 31, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Valassis (NYSE: VCI), one of the nation's leading media and marketing services companies, just extended its reach further in the digital promotion space by launching a compelling application – RedPlum Social Savings™ – built on Facebook Platform. This easy-to-use, skinable app enables the power of human influence in a simple and viral way by allowing friends to use and share compelling offers without leaving Facebook. This app allows advertisers to provide targeted offers to the right people, then gives them the option to share relevant deals with their friends. With this new social marketing tool, Valassis is Re-Imagining Reach™ to empower advertisers to meet consumers in a fun, relevant, easy way.

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Since the beta launch of this first fully integrated couponing app, over 25,000 users have installed it, achieving an astounding 72% adoption rate and have triggered more than 450,000 impressions.  The strong, viral consumer adoption of this easy-to-use app provides an early indication of the value and engagement users are experiencing as they view, share, print and download coupon offers to their grocery store loyalty card instantly. The app's innovative integration with Facebook's Open Graph has generated significant viral promotion and friend engagement with brands, manufacturers and retailers.

"The social world is the new frontier of consumer to brand connections, however, the opinions of those we trust will always have the highest impact," said Jim Parkinson, Valassis Chief Digital Officer.  "Our social coupon app's number one design goal is to allow any brand to connect to the right consumers in a sharable way. The RedPlum Social Savings app allows great offers to get viral traction so consumers can receive them from both the brands and people they trust most."

Valassis is Re-Imagining Reach™ for the way today's digital-savvy consumers plan, shop and purchase to get the right message to the right consumer, in the right medium at the right time. Valassis' complete suite of promotion products, from print to mobile and social, provides brands the ability to continuously engage consumers where they live – geographically, behaviorally, socially – driving awareness to action.

A recent Crowdtap poll found that 70% of consumers are influenced by a friend or family member's online suggestion, meaning marketers need to have a presence on social networks and take a strategic approach to reaching their target consumer. Along with bolstered consumer engagement and increased loyalty, brands that customize the new app will also have access to the full suite of Facebook Insights reports and analytics.

Food Lion, a leading grocer based in Salisbury, North Carolina, is an early adopter of RedPlum Social Savings™. Food Lion operates more than 1,100 supermarkets and employs approximately 57,000 associates delivering quality products, low prices and service to customers in 10 Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic states.

"Food Lion is excited about the opportunity to offer RedPlum Social Savings™ on Facebook," said Kimberly Mohns, Food Lion Social Media Specialist. "We look forward to providing additional savings opportunities to customers and our social-savvy brand ambassadors."

Consumers can get the RedPlum Social Savings^™ app at http://apps.facebook.com/redplumsocialsavings or by searching for "RedPlum Social Savings" on Facebook. 

For more information on the white label app and its brand application, go to: http://bit.ly/P2m4ED.

About Valassis

Valassis is one of the nation's leading media and marketing services companies, offering unparalleled reach and scale to more than 15,000 advertisers. Its RedPlum® media portfolio delivers value on a weekly basis to over 100 million shoppers across a multi-media platform – in-home, in-store and in-motion. Through its digital offerings, including redplum.com and save.com, consumers can find compelling national and local deals. Headquartered in Livonia, Michigan with approximately 7,000 associates in 28 states and eight countries, Valassis is widely recognized for its associate and corporate citizenship programs, including its America's Looking for Its Missing Children® program. Valassis companies include Valassis Direct Mail, Inc., Valassis Canada, Promotion Watch, Valassis Relationship Marketing Systems, LLC, NCH Marketing Services, Inc. and Brand.net.  For more information, visit http://www.valassis.com, http://www.redplum.com and http://www.save.com. To learn about advertising opportunities with RedPlum, please call 1-800-437-0479.

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Cautionary Statements Regarding Forward-looking Statements

This document contains "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties and other factors which may cause our actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Such factors include, among others, the following: price competition from our existing competitors; new competitors in any of our businesses; a shift in client preferences for different promotional materials, strategies or coupon delivery methods, including, without limitation, as a result of declines in newspaper circulation and/or increased competition from new media formats including digital; an unforeseen increase in paper or postal costs; changes which affect the businesses of our clients and lead to reduced sales promotion spending, including, without limitation, a decrease of marketing budgets which are generally discretionary in nature and easier to reduce in the short-term than other expenses; our substantial indebtedness, and ability to refinance such indebtedness, if necessary, and our ability to incur additional indebtedness, may affect our financial health; the financial condition, including bankruptcies, of our clients, suppliers, senior secured credit facility lenders or other counterparties; certain covenants in our debt documents could adversely restrict our financial and operating flexibility; fluctuations in the amount, timing, pages, weight and kinds of advertising pieces from period to period, due to a change in our clients' promotional needs, inventories and other factors, including, without limitation, high levels of coupon redemption rates; our failure to attract and retain qualified personnel may affect our business and results of operations; a rise in interest rates could increase our borrowing costs; possible governmental regulation or litigation affecting aspects of our business; clients experiencing financial difficulties, or otherwise being unable to meet their obligations as they become due, could affect our results of operations and financial condition; uncertainty in the application and interpretation of applicable state sales tax laws may expose us to additional sales tax liability; and general economic conditions, whether nationally, internationally, or in the market areas in which we conduct our business, including the adverse impact of the ongoing economic downturn on the marketing expenditures and activities of our clients and prospective clients as well as our vendors, with whom we rely on to provide us with quality materials at the right prices and in a timely manner. These and other risks and uncertainties related to our business are described in greater detail in our filings with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, including our reports on Forms 10-K and 10-Q and the foregoing information should be read in conjunction with these filings.  We disclaim any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

SOURCE Valassis