Wireless Grids Wants to Hook You Up

Wireless Grids Wants to Hook You Up
The startup may have invented the holy grail of connectivity: a program that lets users link all of their content and devices—and share them with friends

You might think kids in a college dorm could perform any digital feat imaginable, but even for the young and digitally adept there are limits. A student can't, for example, sit on a sofa in the common room, whip out an Apple (AAPL) iPhone, use it to browse a stash of photos on the computer in another room, and then drag and drop them over to a big-screen TV so everyone can look at them together.
The obstacle is this: Electronic gizmos like computers, mobile phones, and TVs weren't designed to share content with each other, and the networks they run on don't speak a common language.
Universal Network
A Syracuse (N.Y.) startup called Wireless Grids intends to change that with software designed to break down the walls between different networks and devices. The technology behind Wireless Grids was developed with the aid of more than $2 million in U.S. government grant money from the National Science Foundation and about $500,000 in funding and research support from U.S. networking gearmakers Cisco Systems (CSCO) and Novell (NOVL), Britain's BT (BT), Japan's Hitachi (HIT), and Finland's Nokia (NOK). U.S. chipmaker Intel (INTC) is considering collaborating with Wireless Grids, while Telecom New Zealand (NZT) is evaluating the technology for use in homes.

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/oct2007/tc20071030_591103.htm

Why unique visitors can be so different?

The article challenged the current methods of measuring "unique visitors". Web analytics platforms typically define an unique visitor as: a unique cookie set on a unique computer and a unique browser that accesses your website. That means if any of those 'unique' factors are changed, one visitor can be counted multiple; or, if two visitors sharing those 'unique' factors (such as members in a family), they are counted as one.

LINK TO THE ARTICLE

privacy statement:HP as an example

When I prepared the blog information, I found that many e-markets, have their own privacy statement. The e-market informs the customer of its Privacy Policy and practices and of the choices the customer can make about the way his information is collected online and how that information is used. Please see HP online privacy staement: http://welcome.hp.com/country/uk/en/privacy.html#1

Google effort to protect privacy

One of the topics for the discussion in the next class is importance of conumer privacy when companies are trying to obtain information about consumers to customize the services provided to them through the internet. This artivle gives some of the initiative being taken by google to protect the users' privacy.

Google cookies will 'auto delete'
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/6901946.stm

Personalization of your internet experience

Hey Everyone,

There is a major trend towards personalization, and customized organization of information on the internet these days. Yahoo! Pipes is one expansive example of such a service. What it ingeniously does, it correlate different web information sources, and gives you an output of those miscellaneous sources. One such an application is to find apartments which are near parks, a service that no pure "map" or pure "real estate" search function can help you with.

Consumers are increasingly taking control of the internet, and sifting through information in more personalized ways (think of iGoogle, RSS feeds, etc.). It will be interesting to watch this trend grow towards a more mainstream application.

Henri Uys

PS: Here is the Google Tech Talk on Yahoo! Pipes, by the creator.

Hulu, the upcoming "legal" rival of Youtube!

While Youtube.com is entering into the advertising, and starts to set up some agreements with the entertainment industry, a new contender is coming to compete into the land of Google’s subsidiary! As a matter of fact, NBC and News Corps clearly want to create through Hulu.com, the “legal Youtube” and the ‘largest network of online Internet videos”. Unlike YouTube, Hulu offers free viewing of full-length films and TV shows from the media giants. Through online advertising and licensed video contents, Hulu.com will be a completely legal concept and will be available for a test version from October for the North-American markets only, but it should be commercialised and accessible everywhere else pretty soon…

For more information, check www.hulu.com!

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Software WAR, A graphic map depicting the epic struggle of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) against the Empire of Microsoft.

QR Code usage in Japan

I rememeber at the first week, Yuri posted one article mentioned about the QR code.
Professor also mentioned about QR code during class many times.
Almost every phone in Japan now has QR code reader function, however, do you know do people feel about QR code in Japan?
Please refer to the article:

QR Code usage in Japan

Customer Service

I found the tips for e-marketers to follow how to create better customer center.

http://www.clearlybusiness.com/advice-and-support/marketing-e-business/sales-service/top-tips-for-excellent-customer-service/

http://www.microsoft.com/smallbusiness/resources/management/customer_relations/7_tips_for_excellent_customer_service.mspx

I am sure this will help us not only understanding the textbook but also
thinking about the customer operator's behavior when they are facing to us.

Forgot what song that was?

I found this cool site that uses voice or tune recognition to find a song in its database. How many of you have listened to a song and forgot the title or maybe do not know the artist? All you need to do is sing or hum part of the song and the site records it. After you are done it searches its database and all matches are returned (other recordings and possibly the original song). You can then listen to the returned recordings and obtain artist information if available.

This has huge potential for online music stores. Many users have heard songs in the past and forgotten the artist or even the words. They may be interested in buying the song or album containing that song. This feature could help them identify the artist and album making search much easier.

Try it out http://www.midomi.com/

Cell Phone Recycling

For anyone interested in cell phone recycling in Japan here is an intersting link from Dowa Mobile.

http://www.dowa.co.jp/en/jigyo/ecosystem_summary.html

Disney Mobile ceasing!

Disney Mobile will cease the operations as of December 31, 2007.
Even there is a huge mobile market in US, WHY???
I wonder if it will marger as "Apple Disney Mobile".............

http://disneymobile.go.com/home/homepage.html"

"Customer Contact Reduction" Program of Wal-Mart

Currently, many online ways of Customer Support and Management have been widely implemented. You can read the Article: "Wal-Mart to Online Customers: Don't Call Us" to further understand about the new program of Wal-Mart.

Link to the article

According to me, Customer Support and Management can not be handled by only technology. Companies should think about how to integrate offline and online ways aiming at offering customers GOOD services.

Advertising personalization and TV over IP

CBS, one of the biggest radio and television broadcasting company in USA, is eager to use the Internet. It has made an alliance with many Web sites which share videos such as Youtube. And, now, it have started to personalize advertisement.

http://www.thenextwave.biz/tnw/?p=404

Value provided by Apple Ipod

Apple Brand

Apple:

IPod: Value that Ipod provides: Take your music library online. This is 2001 presentation of IPod which speaks about Ipod value and boy!! they are true to their promise. Enjoy this presentation by Steve Jobs


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kN0SVBCJqLs

"Cool" and "Personal" way to pay

Pay by Touch


Pay By Touch is a free service that allows you to pay for purchases and access loyalty discounts simply by placing your finger on a sensor when you check out. Your finger links you, and only you, to your accounts – completely eliminating the need to carry cards, checks or cash.


http://www.paybytouch.com/

Customer Service

Online Customer Service

10 Tips to Improve Customer Service

The following link leads to an article written by Elizabeth McGee, an internet marketing consultant. The article shows ten general customer service tips that will encourage customer loyalty in online businesses.

Read the article here.

Customer Acquisition & Customer Retention

Targeted marketing is a critical component of your marketing success. Attracting and retaining profitable customers and turning potential customers into actual customers is a huge challenge – especially when you consider the multitude of consumer data available. Whether it's business-to-business marketing or business-to-consumer marketing, you need to know your customers. By understanding the demographic characteristics, lifestyle behaviors and purchase preferences that drive your audience's decisions, you can successfully tailor your marketing strategies to reach those most likely to purchase your product or service, increase your customer loyalty and improve customer profitability.
Here is the link:
http://www.claritas.com/claritas/customer-retention.jsp

I found the article that DoubleClick launches mobile ad platform.
According to the article, DoubleClick's media company customers can now sell and manage advertisements online and on mobile phones. The new capability is integrated into DoubleClick's publishing service so that publishers can schedule mobile advertisements in the same way that they currently deliver other online ads. The investing to mobile ads this year should reach around $32.2 million, and it will hit $1.4 billion by 2012.

http://www.itworld.com/Tech/2427/070924dcmobile/

news about the newest mobile phone:

T-mobile will be available from October 31, 2007 exclusively to T-Mobile customers in the US. (a price tag of $149.99)

T-Mobile USA has announced the upcoming availability of the Shadow smartphone. This phone has been designed to reduce the complexity associated with a number of feature-rich devices, while at the same time offers powerful calling, messaging and picture sharing capabilities for people who wish to remain connected.

Would you trade privacy for personalization?

An interesting question in relation to the forthcoming class is: To what extent are we (or our customers) willing to trade privacy for personalization? According to this article, the results from the 2006 ChoiceStream Personalization Survey show that 57% of consumers were willing to give up some privacy in return for a personalized online experience.

Can we have the best of both worlds? For example, by letting customers decide the extent to which their online content is personalized and their privacy is compromised? My personal view is that the default position should be strong privacy protection for online consumers (I welcome any proposed legislation that will promote this), but letting customers decide at which end of the privacy/personalization spectrum they wish to reside.

Lease Your Own Mobile SMS Marketing Platform

eMarketers, wanna know how you can jump into the Mobile SMS Marketing space and begin to sell your own Text Messaging Campaigns? If you live in an area fairly populated with Mobile users this can be a nice addition to your Agency offerings........check it out!
http://www.mobilemarketingwatch.com/181/lease-your-own-mobile-sms-marketing-platform/

Who Likes to Personalize Websites?

The following forrester article talks about a survey to find out how many European online users like to personalize websites such as in weather.com, cnn, msn, etc. http://www.forrester.com/Research/Document/0,7211,43546,00.html

The result of the survey was surprising:

• only 17% of them have actually used the technology
  
• 23% did not know they could personalize websites
  
• 56% knew they could personalize it but never tried it

In order to appeal more online audiences to use this personalized tool, as well as to prevent current users from quitting, continuous improvements of its content and function are necessary.

Data Hygiene & CRM

Data hygiene - the principles and practices that serve to maintain accuracy in computer data - is crucial for an effective Customer Relationship Management system. It is a good idea to "clean" database regularly.

Inaccurate data is not only wasteful of the budget, but can adversely affect business' image through:

• wrong addressing
• duplicated mailings
• personalisation errors
  

Inadequate data organisation reduces the ability to communicate to the right customer.

Keeping a customer or prospective customer file up to date will help with marketing costs, improved response rates, better targeting and more accurate communications by telephone, fax, post or email

Excerpt from: http://www.businesslink.gov.uk

Customer Personalisation, A new paradigm in Uganda's pay TV industry..

There is a new twist in the pay TV industry in Uganda. Till recently, it has been a lucrative business only run by the South African Based firm - DSTV ( Multichoice.) With the communication commission opening up this market, DSTV is poised to face competition from new and vibrant pay TV providers. It is working to stem the threat by partnering up with the mobile operators with 3G technology. They will be relaying pay TV to customers mobile phones.

DSTV hopes that this will help to increase customer acqusition and significantly reduce attrition . The strategy is to personalise pay TV services through delivery of more value to the customer. I must hasten to add too, that this is still hype. Multichoice and the phone operators will face the problem of short battery life as the case has been in Japan. (Please have a closer look at this in the link attached http://www.bizcommunity.com/Article/220/66/18932.html

Mobile Payment System

Visa, Nokia turn mobile phones into mobile wallets.


Visa, the world's biggest credit card payment system, has launched a global system to turn mobile phones into wallets for millions of customers in a deal with the world's top handset producer, Nokia .

Read more>>>>http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=93&objectid=10418507

Google pushes the UN on internet privacy

Hello all,

In preparation for our discussion on Internet privacy I looked through articles on this important topic and came up with a mountain of sources. An interesting one was a story about Google urging the UN to push for tighter and more standardized Internet privacy rules around the globe. Today, data in being transferred around the globe and there are few standards regarding the protection of that often proprietary data. Google has taken up the issue and urges the UN to set standards on data security and privacy. An interesting development, but will it lead any where? Did you know that "every time you use a credit card, your details are passed through six different countries." Scary. Take a look. http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2007/sep/14/news.google

Best

Pontus

Customer acquisition on the web "How can cataloguers win on the Web?

Good day Team,
I found this site, http://multichannelmerchant.com/news/marketing_catalogers_win_web/index.html
On the net which points to the fact that the internetnet cannot be used as a stand alone channel to acquire and satisfy customers. It points out the fact that much as we may tout the web as the ultimate cost minimiser and revenue maximiser, the other channels have to leverage on it to deliver value to the customer. Use of the internet adds to the value delivered to the customer. The auther hastens to add that the internet is not just another emerging channel, "It is a superior channel with a better economic model"

Philips Life is simple concept

Hi Everyone,
I found this cool Philips advertising web page. The concept is called "life is simple". The theme is "simplicity is technology that fits seamlessly into your life ". The site has a few targeted products and time line or product selection options to scroll through products for a particular time of day or just by product. If available there are short video clips advertising each starting with the phrases "if all we made were light bulbs, how would you ....?". After the clip plays you can get more information by clicking on the discover more link and then the screen flips. This gives you links to product detail information, the offline store selection option (if you want to shop offline) or the online selection option. The online store option searches for online retail sites (e.g Amazon.com, drugstore.com etc). If you prefer to purchase offline you can enter your postal code and product code search for stores near you.

The site is simple yet attractive and gives you links to detailed product information and options to purchase.

http://www.lifesimplified.philips.com/

I found the article that NTT will launch a Web site leasing service for companies. This site will allow them to use the site for videos and other promotional material. The service will enable even small companies lacking the know-how to create their own Web sites to upload videos related to their products to promote their goods.

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/business/20071019TDY08307.htm

Strategies of Starting an Ebusiness:

On starting an ebusiness, what 's involved? The following article will list the basic components of an eBusiness for someone who wish to start an ebusiness experienc. In that article, the author introduce some key factors on ebusiness, such as choosing your online business "Niche", cusomer surport. Please find http://www.eworkingwomen.com/experts/starting.html

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Use persuasive contents to improve customer experience

 I found an article by Kyle Mac Nabb discussing how marketers can improve the customer experiences by putting more  emphasis on using content to hep customers - whether in the form of providing helpful information on purchase or delivering easy-t0-use content for customer self service. This sounds quite common sense to me, but at the same time it rings true that quite a few internet marketers have taken content management for granted. 

The article link is below

Greenpeace vs Apple Green my Apple to the core

I found an interesting article from Greenpeace campaign regarding iwaste.

http://www.greenpeace.org/international/news/tasty-apple-news-020507

http://www.greenpeace.org/apple/

http://www.greenpeace.org/apple/about.html

http://www.greenpeace.org/apple/itox.html

Consumer Online Reviews Strongly Influence Purchase Decisions

I found this report about a latest survey that 62% of consumers read online reviews and 80% are influenced by them. This again shows the importance of customer to customer communication from the marketer's point of view.

Consumer Online Reviews Strongly Influence Purchase Decisions
http://www.centerformediaresearch.com/cfmr_brief.cfm?fnl=071022

Lesson to learn from Apple: Listening and Communicating with customer

Apple customers? They are definitely a group of passionate, fiercely loyal and strong brand advocates. What could we learn from Apple in terms of customer support?

Here is an example. Last month, when Apple announced lowering the price of the 8GB iphone by $200 just after two months of its release and eliminating the 4GB model, many Apple loyal customers were likely feeling disappointed. Just one day after this announcement, Apple CEO Steve Jobs had come to Apple hotnews forum and issued an open letter to iPhone owners, offering them a $100 credit for being early adopters. This was how Apple sent a message about its loyalty to customers and its respect to customers loyalty.

This story has got widely coverage by the press. Beside positive word of mouth, the letter reached its goal, "appreciation" of Apple loyal fans.

Please skim through the Apple hotnews archive, you can see more posts by Mr. Jobs and see how he cleverly talks and connects with customers.

Online PR- Ads embedded in video games

As I posted few weeks ago, some companies are buying land and buliding their companies in second life for on-line PR.
In video games, there are also some embedded advertisements.

For example:
Grand Theft Auto: Coca-Cola City
Britain recruiting spies with ads embedded in video games

I am not sure will people buy more coca cola if they love Grand Theft Auto or will they apply for the GCHQ's after playing those kinds of games.
But I like their idea!

Customer Service Issues

As we've discussed in class, customer service is an important area for a company to concentrate on. The following site links to an article about some users' bad customer service stories. As we can see, its very easy for users to go online and spread bad experiences with a huge audience.

Worst Customer Service Stories

Arctic Monkeys, the band succeeded by the Internet

Do you know Arctic Monkeys? It is an English rock band, and its success is based on using the Internet. The band obtained a huge number of consumers' attention with demo music files distributed via the net. As a result, its first album, "Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not", became the fastest selling debut album in British music history. The band's success is one of good examples of the change of music industry due to the Internet.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/4660394.stm

89% online consumers face transaction problems!

Application errors could cost a site big money if they are encountered by large numbers of online customers and if they cause customers to turn to competitors’ sites.

The Harris poll, conducted by Harris Interactive, found that 89% of those surveyed about their consumer transactions at shopping, banking, travel and insurance web sites say they expect problems when conducting online transactions. 82% say they are not willing to accept a lower level of service online than in the offline channel, and 34% say they’d turn to a competitor if they did experience problems

http://www.crm2day.com/news/crm/116529.php

Cheers

Vijay

IT enabled Customer Support & Collaboration

I have a paper regarding IT enabled Customer Support & Collaboration. This is about Nokia and written by an employee of Nokia.


http://books.google.com/books?id=HgqVQHpua4IC&pg=PA249&ots=vQZWyxdND1&dq=Customer+Support+and+Collaboration&sig=UIG_arAzJ3b8nYkdVbPGA8V393Y

"Live Chat: Converting Browsers to Buyers"

This article mainly talk about new way to interact with the customers.
This innovative tool lets a company online support staff 'speak' with their consumers visiting their website through chat technology-giving their support staff one-on-one interaction with the website visitors.

online-customer-support-that-works
live-chat-converting-browsers-to-buyers

There is also several outsourcing companies that provide live-chat services for other companies as their business model like www.livesalesman.com

YouTube México

¡Viva YouTube!



Chad Hurley, CEO of YouTube, visited Mexico to promote the new interface of this popular website. This version of YouTube features Mexican content and is available in Spanish.

YouTube is looking to expand its operations abroad since more than 50% of the visitors are from countries different from the U.S.A.

Visit YouTube México.
Read the article "YouTube a la mexicana".

Artificial Intelligent and Customer support

Artificial intelligence (AI) is an interesting discipline. Due to build up intelligence, devices are interact with us and its can support us various way. Now a day’s artificial intelligence are tagged into customer support services. This Article will help all to understand how artificial intelligence grows into a device and where we can use those type of intelligent devices and services.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_intelligence

KFC Went Viral with Cause Marketing Campaign

In order to advertise its new product, KFC used a viral video to promote Teriyaki Boneless Wings. Viral Marketing did work in this case.

You can see the article here: "KFC goes Viral with Cause Marketing Campaign" http://promomagazine.com/interactivemarketing/news/kfc_cause_marketing_campaign_071307/

And the viral video is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6jI8rl5MD0

Source: http://promomagazine.com/

First attempt at Targeted Mobile Advertising in Japan

Hey Everyone,

Just found an interesting article on AU's new AU ONE campaign, which is going to be the first targeted advertising attempt on the mobile platform in Japan.

Check it out!

Henri

Continued Customer Intolerance with eCommerce Failures

The research discovered two 'waves of abandonment" by consumers:
1, when transaction failed; and
2, when they received an unsatisfactory level of service after contacting the company

Link to the article

According to the survey, 53% of respondents that hit difficulties online would contact customer service. But of those, 49% said they did not have their issue resolved.
As a result, 52% of respondents that had bad experience with contact centre had stopped doing business with the company.


Mai
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Mobile Advertising Guidelines

I found a detailed article about Mobile Advertising Guidelines published by the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA). MMA has been providing thought leadership and customized for mobile industry formats, guidelines and best practices since 2003. The latest release of the Mobile Advertising Guidelines is the fourth revision and is intended to keep pace with constantly changing network speeds, handset capabilities and operator specifications. The guidelines are created collaboratively with all parties in the mobile marketing ecosystem, including operators, content providers, agencies, brands, and technology enablers.
The guidelines provide the formats, guidelines and the best practices necessary to implement mobile advertising initiatives. All parties involved in mobile advertising programs should be familiar and compliant with Mobile Advertising Guidelines and their practical implementation.
Here is the link.
http://www.mmaglobal.com/mobileadvertising.pdf

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Xu, Fangjie

Felica: the “mobile wallet” technology !

The Japanese mobile industry is unique… We all know that but let’s discover how in a few points through the Felica microship technology, developed by Sony. A very clear and interesting report about the Felica world: check this video out!

==> http://mobilepayment.typepad.com/paiement_mobile/2007/03/felica_en_dtail.html

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More about Affiliate Marketing by Mr.Chaffey

Hello everyone,

I came across our textbook author's website, davechaffey.com, and found free internet marketing resources, Excel spreadsheets, and up-to-date articles regarding eMarketing which I thought they are very useful resources and tools for our project and case assignments. The following link talks about affiliate marketing in detail (definition, its benefits, its problems, etc.):

http://www.davechaffey.com/E-marketing-Insights/Affiliate-marketing/Affiliate-marketing-definition/

Measuring online customer service

The topics to be covered in the next class include how the Internet has both a positive, as well as negative, impact on customer support and management. It is clear that the Internet has the potential to improve customer service, so one question of interest would be: How should online customer service be measured and improved? In the article titled "Measuring the Impact of the Internet on Customer Relationships", Jim Sterne addresses this question among others.

Consider these questions posed in the article: "Do visitors look at two or three pages and then leave? Do they look at the glossary, the knowledge base, and the troubleshooting guide and still go to Contact Us? " I agree with the author's implicit view that web analytics can be used to track such information and the results of such analysis can provide useful information to companies who can then better tailor their approach to customer service.

Starbucks is using mobile marketing - Are you onboard yet?

Check the article..."At Starbucks, Songs of Instant Gratification"

Here is the link....
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/01/technology/01impulse.html?_r=3&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&ref=technology&adxnnlx=1191258593-SprF1hO8wuK6tIL/PA/fBA&oref=slogin

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WHY eMARKETER?

I found an interesting site "eMarketer" provides the information marketers need to keep up-to-date with trends and developments in online marketing and emerging media.

Ref. http://www.emarketer.com/Welcome.aspx?src=home_topnav_reportsell

Search Engine Optimization of the Future

Hi All,
We had discussed a lot about the Search Engine Optimization last class. i found the article about creating SEO is no longer easy. Affiliating with partner or keyword focus pages is no longer guarantee to be high rank. This article mentioned about SEO technique we should avoid because Google tries to eliminate the thin affiliate website and provide only relevant results. Google starts hiring humans to review the site to make sure that it's clean.

Here's the site, please enjoy:
http://www.2createawebsite.com/traffic/seo-optimization.html

Tips for affiliate marketing

• Ensure you recruit partners who have reputable web sites : If you take a shotgun approach and accept any affiliate you can quickly have your brand undermined by cowboys using unethical marketing techniques such as spamming.
• Focus on having relevant partners : Affiliate partners will be targeting the audiences you want to reach,irrelevant partners just won’t generate appropriate leads.
• Ensure your products are promoted in a compelling way : Many affiliate marketers provide affiliates with appropriate promotional collateral (copy, images. web pages etc) to ensure this happens.
• Pick an appropriate payment structure : You may want to pay affiliates for the traffic they send your way (pay per click), however this is risky and open to abuse . A better approach is to instead pay a % commission based on actual business generated. That way it’s a win-win.

excerpt from http://www.viz.co.nz/affiliate-marketing.htm

Voice Mail Driving You Crazy? Get It In Writing

One of the newest convergence points of mobile phones and the Web is a group of services that convert your voice mail to text and send it to your e-mail in-box.

Why can't voice mail be more like e-mail?

Each interface with a customer is a great opportunity

Numerous articles deal with how customer service and support can be a great opportunity to build a stronger and more profitable relationship with the customers. This turns out to be quite challenging in the real world where companies need to manage complex technical and social interactions.
There is an interesting online magazine called Inc.com which contains many articles on entrepreneurship and business development. See attached link on customer service: http://www.inc.com/resources/office/articles/20050101/customers.html
Customer service should be a events/interaction where companies build and strenghten their relationships with their clients, not a portal where they simply solve daily problems.
Best to all,
Pontus

If we mistype the adress

I agree mistyping the address is a syrious problem, which is also mentioned in the class.

If I mistiped from Wikipedia to Wikipydia, we could see totally dufferent homepage.

1. This is the online encyclopedia.
http://wikipedia.org/

2. But if I mistype...
http://www.wikipydia.org/

http://www.wikipidya.org/

I think this is dangerous not only for the biginers.

Driving Customers; Not just site traffic!

When Forrester last asked marketers to list all of the media they used to drive Web site traffic and to rate each one's effectiveness, we discovered a huge mismatch -- the most commonly used tactics were not the ones that marketers believed to be the most effective.

Though e-mails proved to be effective, it receives a big setback with consumers who have been using e-mail for more than 4 years.

Check the link
http://www.forrester.com/ER/Research/Brief/0,1317,12053,00.html

Cheers,

Vijay

Group Meeting Friday, 19 October, 9.00 PM

Let us meet tomorrow friday, 19 October, 9.00 PM in the study room.

Agenda: Case 1 of e-marketing

Please read the case and be prepared.

Customer Aquisition -The viral way

Good day E-Biz team, Bring 'em on!!! I browsed through the web trying to find out why major companies accross the globe are looking to viral marketing as the new frontier to get their message to the target market. Word of mouth marketing, as i found out, takes the lead where the orthodox methods wane. The success of word of mouth marketing anchors on the credibility, or the apparent credibility of the social media with fora like this one. I had a look into one of Naome Kleins books 'No Logo.' It uncovers a betrayal of the central promises of the information age: choice, interactivity, and increased freedom. The reverence which corporations enjoyed as engines of the economy is steeply waneing, as is their protection from consumer rage through information assymetry. Word of mouth and the social media are a new and formidable force in getting produce and service information effectively accross to the target audience.A look at her video clip, though remotely related to the subject, will throw more light on this issue.http://www.naomiklein.org/main

Customer Aquisition -The viral way

Customer Aquisition -The viral way Good day E-Biz team, Bring 'em on!!! I browsed through the web trying to find out why major companies accross the globe are looking to viral marketing as the new frontier to get their message to the target market. Word of mouth marketing, as i found out, takes the lead where the orthodox methods wane. The success of word of mouth marketing anchors on the credibility, or the apparent credibility of the social media with fora like this one. I had a look into on Naome Kleins book 'No Logo.' It uncovers a betrayal of the central promises of the information age: choice, interactivity, and increased freedom. The reverence which corporations enjoyed as engines of the economy is steeply waneing - as is their protection from consumer rage through information assymetry. Word of mouth and the social media are a new and formidable force in getting produce and service information effectively accross to the target audience.A look at her video clip, though remotely related to the subject, will throuw more light on this issue.http://www.naomiklein.org/main

Customer Acquisition and Profitability?

This new article from Wired Magazine talks about Facebook's "revolutionary" approach to web business. But if you read carefully, "For all the excitement, one sobering fact remains: Facebook has yet to prove itself as a business."

On New media/New communicaiton

When I start to learn new knowledge or get new inforamtion, I usually ask myself firstly what it is or how to define it. Although semantics methodology is limited to find an accurate and objective definition of term, it is truely useful to set up a platform for commucicaiton and understanding. On these terms, e.g new media, digital media, traditiaonal media, Maybe, we could not define them absolutely besides list some characteristics of them, but we might try to clarify these terms to avoid misunderstanding or misapplications. An article linked below provides both clarity of terms and clarity of concepts on media, the Interpersonal and Mass media, the new media for communicaion, etc. Maybe, you couldnot agree with the author, but you should not ignore his opinion. Please see http://rebuildingmedia.corante.com/archives/2006/04/27/what_is_new_media.php

Meta Tag Lawsuits

Some companies actually sued other companies for using their company's name in meta-tags. Playboy won a piracy suit against Asia Focus, a company based in Hong Kong, which result a $3 million compensation. Although by doing this you can get your competitor's customer to get into your website, but the risk is quite adverse.

http://www.news.com/2100-1023-210449.html

In this article you can see other cases about meta-tags lawsuit http://searchenginewatch.com/showPage.html?page=2156551


Mela

Podcasting for Business

Nowadays, Podcast is a very famous audio distribution channel. I believe it can be a good marketing tool. This page explains the importance of Podcasting for Business briefly. And if you need more information about Podcast, you can obtain it from the links of the page.

http://podcastingscout.com/why-podcasting-for-business

More Virtual Worlds: Yes, Really

Catching Attention is the first important step in marketing. Catching attention in the world of instant and diverse information like Internet is not as easy as "just-one-click" of the mouse might sound. Retaining and developing customers loyalty in the world of choices, undisclosed identity like Internet is even more difficult. So what can help to lock in customers in this virtual world? Now, big companies are trying to put their mind into customers' mind...creating virtual reality along with their own, branded online world. Paul Hyman, Business Week Online, have examined the issue in a recent article : http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/content/oct2007/id20071015_036882.htm

According to this analysis, the Second Life could be as much enterprise tool as marketing ploy. Examples are media companies who are enthusiastically creating these explorable online lands. Warner Bros. with T-Works to be released in 2008, a virtual destination that would bring together all the key characters from its core animated brands, including Looney Tunes, Hanna-Barbera and DC Comics. And Disney recently purchased Club Penguin site which is said to have 12 million free and paid active visitors. So Pirates of the Caribbean will be on virtual world next month and users can participate with his/her own avatar to become real pirates on that explorable online sea.

Do eBay ads Go Overboard?

This article on PC World website concerns eBay's policy of using contextual advertising, i.e. external ads on eBay pages with products competing with eBay's sellers'. The policy is criticized by eBay sellers as it could be luring potential buyers away.

Link to the article

An obvious "advertising revenue vs. customers (eBay sellers)' interest" situation.
This reminds the story of Livejournal few months ago, when they announced their "special expression of thank" to all dear paid users (who pays Livejournal 20USD per year for a blog FREE OF ADVERTISEMENT). Guess what? It was an image of a PEPSI COKE which paid users could "use as wished". Most users chose to forward the image straight to Livejournal's profile page as a way of 'virtually throwing a can of coke to Livejournal's head'.
It's unknown how much Livejournal received from Pepsi back then, but clearly a bad move for both.


Mai
2A7208

Word-of-Mouth the Most Powerful Selling Tool

The article is about Nielsen's most recent global survey among 26,486 internet users in 47 markets in Europe, Asia Pacific, the Americas and the Middle East on their attitudes toward thirteen types of advertising - from conventional newspaper and television ads to branded websites and consumer-generated content.

Link to the article

Surprisingly or not, the most traditional method of word-of-mouth remains the most trusted source (78%). Consumer opinions posted on review sites are trusted by 61% of web users, while for branded websites, this figure is 60%.
Permission based email - 49%
Search engine ads - 34%
Banner ads - 26%
Mobile text ads - 18%


Mai
2A7208

Boycott of Gillette: “I would rather grow a beard!”

-An illustration of customer empowerment and negative word-of-mouth through the use of Internet-

During the last lecture, we were talking about how customers’ complaints could make your business go bankrupt through the PayPal example (www.paypalsucks.com). Indeed, the eMarketing web might be extremely profitable for plenty of companies but customers or even competitors might also use the Internet medium to drag you down and let you know they are not satisfied with your products/services.

They can organize themselves into more or less influential communities able to kill your business. Consumers are indeed actively communicating between each other and ignoring what they say, from what we have seen, could turn out to be a disaster for the firm. Since we keep on thinking that Internet will in most of the cases bring cash in, it’s also interesting to take a look at companies suffering from the Internet tool.

That’s the case of Gillette, the razor and blade company, which experienced a dramatic moment with a website they wish they had never heard of: www.boycottgillette.com. The website (as well as many other online articles) is basically blaming Gillette for putting tracking devices into its products and to have hidden cameras in Gillette spy shelves taking mug shots of people who pick up their products! The same target customers who have made companies such as Gillette successful could become your biggest threat!

Believe the story or not, up to you, but be sure of one thing: companies take this kind of problem very seriously! For the story, I personally wrote a complaint to Gillette regarding the customer tracking associated with a made-up story regarding a previous CRM study about how companies could deal with the customers’ complaints online. And guess what… They of course denied the tracking accusations and last but not least, they offered me a free razor to retain my loyalty to the brand!

Loïc, 2A7507

Conference on "Future of Mobile"

I don’t think you guys will go, but check it out! There is a conference on the future of mobile in November 2007, wow! You may look at the presentation topics, to get some more ideas or topics to work in our Mobile Lab!

The link:
http://www.future-of-mobile.com/

Naveed, 2A7201

XML and RSS

To be honest, I am just catching up new trends in the internet,
like Blog, podcast, XML, which is written in the Chapter 8 of the textbook.

For example, I did not catch the meaning of the word "XML" in the textbook (P.387)
so that I went to the internet and searched the definition.
I went to the Wikipedia, which the professor mentioned in the class.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XML

If my understanding is correct, XML is like an HTML, a language with tags used in the internet.
We can use any tag we want with definition and we can use like an database.
I understand that it is used at least in the blogs and RSS.
This contains example of XML for news article.

http://www.xml.com/pub/a/2002/12/18/dive-into-xml.html


P.S. Also, I found there is a online e-marketing education site.
I am sure it will help us understanding more of the textbook.

http://www.businesslink.gov.uk/bdotg/action/layer?topicId=1075384972

Europe's Search Engine Marketing Investment to exceed € 8 Billion in 2012

In an arcticle on Forrestor Mary Beth Kemp writes on the findings of Forrestor research. The report states that Marketers in Europe are spending € 4.5 Billion on search marketing per year and are expected in the next five years to increase this to € 8.1 Billion, an 80% increase. The report analyses the growth in internet usage and expenditure by marketers on search marketing.

http://www.forrester.com/Research/Document/0,7211,42707,00.html

Lead Generation and Customer Acquisition Techniques

Sibtain Ali Tarar

2A7202

"Without a customer, you don't have a business. You have a hobby."—Wall Street Journal

Targeted marketing is a critical component of your marketing success. Attracting and retaining profitable customers and turning potential customers into actual customers are a huge challenge – especially when you consider the multitude of consumer data available. By understanding the demographic characteristics, lifestyle behaviors and purchase preferences that drive your audience's decisions, you can successfully tailor your marketing strategies to reach those most likely to purchase your product or service, increase your customer loyalty and improve customer profitability. I searched an article on the internet which can provide you with comprehensive details of "Lead Generation and Customer Acquisition Techniques."

http://www.dspconnect.com/techniques/techniques_main.asp?category=customerAcquisition

Hi Everyone,

I found this interesting company that provides us e-marketing service.
Here is one of success stories of certain restaurant by e-mail marketing and survey.
Although this is inside of an advertising of this company, it refers to one of e-mail marketing.


http://search.constantcontact.com/email-marketing-success/case-studies/fajita-grill.jsp

Shunsuke

How could Tell Shell have saved itself?

I came across this article titled " Leveraging User Generated Content" by Brian Haven on Forrester and it touches on a specific point that professor Sugai mentioned in class last time. Remember how Shell failed to use Tell Shell as a channel to come closer to its customers because they did not know how to deal with nasty comments on the site? Here comes the solution. According to Brian Haven, marketers should never miss using User Generated Content (including blogs) as a way to connect with their customers. Blogs that incorporates customers' comments like Tell Shell is not a bad idea, but the key is how you leverage these content. This is one of the tatics Brian recommended to manage negative comments:

"...Respond to negative commentary.
Start off by establishing clear guidelines about what is allowed and what is not — both for your staff and for customers on your branded UGC sites. Don’t block negative content, but have a plan in place to respond. If you see a consistent type of feedback,make a blanket response addressing those issues. For individual cases, respond back to resolve the issue, just like you would for a customer service call. Most importantly, be clear about how you will respond, and don’t block content because it’s in disagreement with your point of view — leaving that content demonstrates transparency and builds authenticity for your
brand. Over time, you’ll see other people on the site writing back to each other in defense ofyour brand ..."

What do you think? Is this really an effective way to respond to negative comments on companys' blogs? Can we really leverage User Generated Content to our advantages?

For those of you who are interested, this is the link of the article ( make sure you have a Forrester account :)
http://www.forrester.com/Research/Document/0,7211,40753,00.html

Co-Advertising: Bond and Ford

Hi guys

I want to share with you something about Co-Advertising relationship, it's one method to advertise one company's product.

It's the Co-Advertising between Bond - Casino Royale 2006 and Ford Motor Company in launching the new Bond and New Ford Mondeo. Both of 2 sides made use of this chance to advertise for their products. You can read it here: http://www.mi6.co.uk/sections/articles/bond_21_ford_mondeo.php3?t=bond21&s=bond21 (1)

Besides, in the past, many brands did seek for opportunities to make their products appear in Bond series. The article that you may like to read: The business of Bond. Here is the link: http://money.cnn.com/2002/11/21/news/james_bond/index.htm (2)

Although not all Co-advertising campaigns were successful, still, Co-advertising is truly an enormous Brand building opportunity.

Source: (1) http://www.mi6.co.uk/; (2): http://money.cnn.com/

Social Media and Interactive Marketing

Responding to our upcoming class topic, “Strategies for Customer Acquisition”, I found these articles from Forrester that discuss how social integrating media, such as blog, YouTube, e-discussion forum, etc., can be utilized and integrated into corporate marketing. Through social media, millions of internet users started to give each other advice on what to purchase and what not. One bad customer review of a product on a blog can tremendously reduce its company’s revenue. Consumers listen and trust more to what other consumers say than to what commercial says. Peer-to-Peer or “words of mouth” social networking sites are, thus, very powerful marketing tools. In order to regain the trust, firms need to get in touch with their customers by opening online discussions and start sharing on all elements of business.

For further detail, please click the following links.

http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/8765.asp
http://www.forrester.com/Research/Document/0,7211,40985,00.html

China's E-marketing learns to drive

As China's Internet market develops, so does China's Internet marketing. E-marketer found out what's hot there right now with Vincent Kobler, CEO of Shanghai-based interactive marketing agency EmporioAsia.
Although China is a bit behind the US in terms of interactive, it's really growing at a very rapid pace, and a lot of big multinational brands are seeing the need to do interactive marketing. It's also becoming more effective. They see the effectiveness of an e-mail campaign that you can track, or doing a web site where you can see various metrics.
Check out the article at: http://banners.noticiasdot.com/termometro/boletines/docs/consultoras/emarketer/2004/0404/emarketer_300404-2.pdf

5 Ways To Watch TV On Your PC

Here are some interesting ways to get television on your computer but most shows are available on you tube.

http://tech.yahoo.com/blog/null/15069;_ylt=AqNJ7sJPGI1uQo.goKTZRdIRLpA5

Article on internet maerketing without spamming

Hi Everyone,

I found this interesting article that gives suggestions how one can market through internet without actually spamming the mail boxes of strangers with advertisment mails. It talsk about use of forums as an effective means of e-marketing.

Yours truly,
L.Karthik

Pls find below the link

Difference Between Internet Marketing & SPAM!By Strive Mazunga
http://ezinearticles.com/?Difference-Between-Internet-Marketing-and-SPAM!&id=649738

I have found this interesting article which titled
"How to Build Great Websites Using Grandma's Apple PIE Recipe"

this article mainly give a several simple ideas to make our website or our internet business interesting to visitors which can lead to a loyal customers.
the article is explained in a very easy way.

This is the link
http://www.coachingsitesthatwork.com/articles/build-great-websites-using-pie-recipe.asp

Online PR- Eye Project by KDDI

In Japan, many people have their own blogs.
Lots of people enjoy share their feeling and what they found on their blogs.
Therefore, some companies create cool blog parts in order to make people put the links in their blogs.
Eye Project is one of the cool idea.
After you access that site, even though you don't understand Japanese, will you link it in your blog?

Dear fellow students,

this upcoming class we'll be discussing customer acquisition. However, a recent Forrester research report identifies a new opportunity by challenging the general notion of acquiring customers and arguing for exploiting customer potential by increasing penetration of existing customers.

http://www.forrester.com/Research/Document/0,7211,40650,00.html

Most interestingly applying reverse logic, a similar argument was made by Reichheld and Sasser in an Harvard Business Review article from 1990 (Zero Defections) where they argue why it is mandatory to keep customers happy.

In conjunction this made me wonder if there is such a thing as a marketing thinking/learning life cycle, i.e. if certain patterns of marketing strategy thinking repeat themselves over and over again when new fields are entered.

What do you think?
see you in class,
Manuel

Permission-based email marketing: "Single opt in" versus "double opt in"

In relation to the topics to be covered in the next class, I found an article written by Simon Akers which describes both the "single opt in" and "double opt in" approaches in relation to email marketing, and the article even compares the pros and cons of each. I personally advocate permission-based marketing, and would prefer a "double opt in" approach for email marketing, but this could be due to my consumer-biased, "spam adverse" mindset. At the end of the article, there is a link to another interesting article, titled "Email Marketing Tips - Holding Peoples Interest" written by Tyler Houts. Both articles are short and highly readable.

If the links in my main text do not work, here are the URLs:
http://www.marketassociate.com/2007/03/08/email-marketing-tips-single-opt-in-versus-double-opt-in/
http://www.marketassociate.com/2007/02/19/how-to-hold-peoples-interest-in-your-email-marketing-campaigns/

Hitchiker's Guide to the Internet

Hey Everyone,

iA Web Trendmap


Found this very interesting "map of the internet", where the 200 most visited websites in the world are put into the Tokyo Metro Map. The Yamanote line is replaced by "Main sites", and other lines form some basic categories. It also includes weather forecasts (if the web-site is in trouble or healthy), and is a great way of understanding the connections between internet spaces.

Enjoy!

Henri

Information overload

Greetings,

We have been discussing the rapidly increasing amount of information in the e-world and how easy it is to access that information. As we consider how to get and retain the attention of potential customers, we need to consider the challenges brought about by information overload. Consumers are bombarded by information which is seldom filtered for their needs and is often irrelevant and annoying. Simply adding more information to our sites and using bigger font/cooler graphics is not the answer. E-marketers are fighting for the attention of an already information saturated consumer. Smarter and more customized approaches are needed. Check out the article of info overload at: http://www.infoworld.com/articles/ca/xml/00/01/10/000110caoverload.html

Best

Pontus

7 tricks to viral marketing

Hello all,

Follow the link to find some viral marketing tips and tricks from one consultant's viewpoint. Although you may disagree with some of what he has written, it still provides a starting point on effective viral marketing.

Google

The threats against Google.

Will we keep googling?

A quite interesting article that recognizes the significant and apparently unstoppable growth of Google but at the same time, describes some of the most important threats against this Internet giant. Read and find out what could be the "silver bullet" for Google in the future.

Read the article in The New York Times.

Visit Google.com.

Digital strategy

In the fields of strategic management, marketing strategy, and operational strategy, digital strategy is the process of specifying an organization's vision, initiatives and processes in order to deploy their online assets (as of 2007, these include: web sites, mini-sites, mobile sites, digital audio and video content, rich Internet applications, community groups, banner ads, search engine marketing, affiliate programs, etc.) in a manner which maximizes the business benefits they provide to the organization.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_strategy
Note: This article is related with our next class "Customer Acquisition".

Define Interactive Marketing Communication

Hello all,
I think this article is related to our next class. It showed the interactive communication is so meaningful in today business. This article shows the changes in Ads from advertising medium to two-way medium. Also, the Ads had to modernise because market place keep changing; form newspaper to E-ads. Customer loyalty decreases due to the flood of information. Moreover, the article stated about the result of lack of communication competence, the need and result of interactive marketing communication, how interactive communication turns passive Ads in to active communication, and end up with sales growth, enhance relationship, and gained loyalty. Lastly, the article provided some tricks to become effective marketing communication.

Here's the link:
http://ezinearticles.com/?Understanding-Interactive-Marketing-Communication&id=474115

Modern marketing

Modern marketing is a way of doing business, heavily based on the "marketing concept" which holds that businesses and organizations should:
(1) design their products/services to meet customer needs and wants;
(2) focus on those people most likely to buy their product rather than the entire mass market; and
(3) develop marketing efforts that fit into their overall business objectives.
By adopting this concept you not only provide your customers with better products, you will avoid wasting valuable time and money developing and promoting a product or service nobody wants.

Ref. http://web1.msue.msu.edu/imp/modtd/33700082.html

Because I am crazy

"The Agriculture Ministry is not in charge of Gundam"
-Government of Japan-

Recently this week Japanese Government has reprimanded six bureaucrats for shirking their duties after an internal auditing found that they had spent many work hours contributing to the Wiki-pedia website - including 260 entries about cartoon robot.

Oh what such an impact of Internet Marketing !?!?

MLM SALES ON THE INTERNET

Multi-level marketing (MLM) is a business model that combines direct marketing with franchising. Multi-level marketing businesses function by recruiting salespeople (also called Distributors, Independent Business Owners, IBOs, Franchise Owners, Sales Consultants, Beauty Consultants, Consultants, etc.) to sell a product and offer additional sales commissions based on the sales of people recruited into their downline, an organization of people that includes direct recruits, recruits' recruits, etc. This arrangement is similar to franchise arrangements where royalties are paid from the sales of individual franchise operations to the franchisor as well as to an area or region manager, but in some MLM programs, there can be seven or more levels of people receiving royalties from one person's sales. But the link below talks about the MLM through internet!!
Check it out:
http://www.mlmlegal.com/MLMsoftware/internet_sales.html

Mohammad Naveed Ahmed
2A7201

What is the perfect sales letter layout

Hi,everyone,

Do you think sales letter is very important? Do you ask yourself what is the perfect sales letter layout? I believe every business man should think about it. Because it is the first step to be successful.Perfect sales letter will catch up the consumers. I recommend an article which is about how to prepare for a perfect sales letter. I hope that it is useful to you.please see http://www.teawithedge.com/emarketing_articles/e-marketing%3a_strategy/the_perfect_sales_letter_layout?_20070209481.html

ID 2A7602

Viral Marketing

Hey Everyone,

Here are some links to something that I find very interesting, namely Viral Marketing in the age of the internet. The principle is mainly this: To create & communicate hype and brand information through a message which is not overtly linked to the brand in question, i.e. it relies on creating a word-of-mouth chain effect (like some pyramid schemes), and doesn't related much information except for the tacit brand "texture". Youtube is literally buzzing with such ads, which are usually denoted by higher production values and/or real actors. Although this is not a new concept, it has achieved a much greater impact and reach through the proliferation of SNSs and video uploading sites.

Here is an example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYhCn0jf46U (Dove: Real Beauty)
Also: http://www.subservientchicken.com/ (Burger King Ad)

Some other links to check out:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viral_marketing
http://www.wilsonweb.com/wmt5/viral-principles.htm

Best Regards,

Henri Uys
(1A6068)

Sibtain Ali
ID # 2A7202
The Internet is an enabling technology, creating value innovations it has allowed companies to affect both their demand and costs at the same time. In my research I divided the “Impact of Internet on E-Marketing strategy” in to two perspectives.
1. Macro Perspective
2. Micro Perspective

1. Macro perspective

1.1 Organizational Issues
Sharma and Sheth propose that organizations need to change their focus from “supplier perspective” to “customer perspective.” In order to succeed, companies will have to be more concerned with better responding to customer demand. With customers as starting point, organizations will seek relationship with financially and strategically sound customers. Also, the Internet will blur the distinctions between advertising, personals selling and distribution. Successful companies will adopt a more integrated view of the e-marketing function, translating into new organizational designs. New forms of organization will come into being and much research is needed to understand the organizational evolution.

1.2 Strategic alliances
To put it simply, organizations not only have to integrate functions within their organization, but also need to develop strategic alliances to survive in this uncertain global business environment. Internet alliances allow an organization to offer an infinite array of products and value-added service at lower levels of investment and risk. Alliances add value by deepening product/service offerings, gaining channel access, gaining access to partner's customer base and gaining access to technology and e-marketing services.

1.3 Privacy issues at the societal level
Langenderfer and Cook argue that a national agency regulating privacy concerns would benefit both consumers and businesses by creating a predictable legal environment. Langenderfer and Cook advocate quasi-public regulation at the federal level. Whatever the requirement of today's laws, the message is loud and clear: companies must undertake appropriate measures to protect data privacy in order to attract consumers to the online environment.

2. Micro Perspective

2.1 Typologies of e-shoppers
The typology of online shoppers may change as more consumers adopt the online environment. Consumers will be drawn to the online environment, as more “brick and click” types enter this market. Bricks and clicks offer the convenience of online ordering and receiving goods in a relatively short period of time from the store nearby with added convenience of returning items to any store. Such value enhancement may change the shopping typologies and therefore deserve some attention. Britain's Tesco.com is a good example. Tesco delivers online orders from nearby neighborhood Tesco stores using only few trucks per store. Tesco delivers from nearly 250 stores and it is within a half-hour reach of 91% of the British population. With around 3.7 million orders per year, Tesco's online sales were around 450 million with a net margin of more than 5%.

2.2 Heuristics used in the search process
Reliance on hotlists shortens the search process and therefore hotlists positively affect the likelihood of visiting a website. More research is needed to understand consumer search for products and services in an online environment and the heuristics that guide decision-making in that environment.

2.3 Web design
Rosen and Purinton, based on research, recommends that web designers should integrate minimalism, appeal, access, fast loading and distinctiveness into their websites in order to be more effective. Dailey, in a related research on web design, found that restrictive navigational cues act as barriers that threaten consumers' control over web navigation which, in turn, arouses psychological reactance and leads to negative consequences for the web marketer.

Hey fellows,

this Manuel your new e-marketing classmate writing. I found an article on the internet that revolves around a woman's dream and a man's nightmare: beauty shopping over the internet !!!!

I liked the article because I feel that this kind of shopping is not explored well enough and could easily become a blue ocean. The author provides evidence from surveys, that suggests that it would be welcome by female customers.
What intrigues me most, are the unrealized possibilities to design shopping differently, that lurk in there. My entrepreneurial thoughts have revolved about clothes shopping very often, however, not for the same reasons, some of our female classmates think about shopping.

On first sight, beauty shopping over the internet might be counterintuitive, because girls usually like to visit as many stores as possible and try on as much as they can. But hey girls, have you ever thought what it would be like, if you could just go online, check out as many things as you want, maybe even use 3D imaging and biometric data to virtually wear the clothes and then have a very exquisit selection shipped to your home or a local outlet?
Guys, have you ever thought how easy it would be if you could virtually look at clothes on your body and then make a QUICK and PAINLESS decision?

I'm very curious with what we can come up if we discuss this topic in class some day. Feel free to take a look at the report.
http://www.onlinefilefolder.com/index.php?action=getshare&type=0&user_num=57142&share_id=158532&hash=580dc43b786f4c33c9a594ecc36444a4

or if this one doesn't work try:
www.guitarrock.us/e-marketing

Greetz,
Manuel

Radiohead's new album

Hi all,

I've found many articles relating to Radiohead's upcoming album. Basically, they are offering their upcoming album as a download for whatever price you want to pay. Thats right, you can pay as much, or as little, as you like. Besides the download, consumers can pay for a physical box set (about $80 US), featuring several exclusives not available via download.

It will be interesting to see how this pans out. What does offering your music online for whatever price the consumer wants mean for the future of music sales (and downloads). And how will this affect the traditional marketing approaches used by the major labels?

News article re: Radiohead
Radiohead download site

Spoonkey.com,: the last French innovative eMarketing concept

Good evening dear eMarketing fellows! :-)

I am glad to share with you my first weekly blog posting! Since we are still at the very beginning of this exciting and challenging class, I don’t want to boggle the minds! Then, ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce you a very easy but also innovative “eBiz” concept made in France: it’s Spoonkey.com, a fast and free identification system.

The principle is really simple: you sign up on the website and you get a unique key such as ““wizishop10023MrSugaiFishingSalmonsInTheUrasaRiver”. This key will be asked on all the partnered websites (e-business …) in order to sign up in a fast and easy way without filling out the usual long and annoying questionnaires.

Okay regarding the advantages for the consumer…But what about the seller? 3 big advantages: better quality results with regards to the addresses and 100% valid emails! Last but not least, a platform enabling the company to promote new websites, it’s obvious…

Spoonkey.com is currently dealing with 60 big French internet companies and so far, they are experiencing a positive answer rate of around 97%. For information, the membership fees for the sellers are spread out between 100€ (16,500Yens) (for less than 1000 visitors/ year) and 10,000€ (1,652,000Yens) for the biggest clients (+ 1million visitors a month…

The concept is completely new, and will be officially launched on the French market from November… But we can be sure similar ideas are going to emerge everywhere on the Web sphere pretty soon!

Just keep in mind this tricky number: according to the research institute OpinionWays, 44% of Internet users don’t fully complete an online registration questionnaire when they access a new website… As a matter of fact, eBusiness websites lose a lot of potential clients through thos stage… With Spoonkey.com, be warned, it’s going to change!! Purchasing on eBay, iTunes and Skype will soon be a matter of ID name… Good eMarketing ideas are often the easiest ones!

For more information about this new eMarketing concept, go to www.spoonkey.com!

The Top 10 E-marketing strategy issues of today and tomorrow?

Here is the articles about how to make e-marketing really work in the business world. The author provided 10 strategic issues from his personal experince since he has been working with the integrated organizations.

Here's the articles:
http://www.wnim.com/archive/issue2904/emarketing.htm

another interesting book by Thomas L. Friedman--The Lexus and the Olive Tree

When I went through all the blog articles, I found Max mentioned the book by Thomas L. Friedman named "The World is Flat". This book is very popular in China. I read this book months before and wrote an article in my blog. But here I want to introduce another book written by Thomas L. Friedman in 1999--The world is Flat:The Lexus and the Olive Tree.

Friedman has drawn on his years on the road to produce an engrossing and original look at the new international system that, more than anything else, is shaping world affairs today: globalization.

His argument can be summarized quite simply. Globalization is not just a phenomenon and not just a passing trend. It is the international system that replaced the Cold War system. Globalization is the integration of capital, technology, and information across national borders, in a way that is creating a single global market and, to some degree, a global village.
You cannot understand the morning news or know where to invest your money or think about where the world is going unless you understand this new system, which is influencing the domestic policies and international relations of virtually every country in the world today. And once you do understand the world as Friedman explains it, you'll never look at it quite the same way again.

With vivid stories and a set of original terms and concepts, Friedman shows us how to see this new system. He dramatizes the conflict of "the Lexus and the olive tree" -- the tension between the globalization system and ancient forces of culture, geography, tradition, and community. He also details the powerful backlash that globalization produces among those who feel brutalized by it, and he spells out what we all need to do to keep this system in balance.

Finding the proper balance between the Lexus and the olive tree is the great drama of the globalization era, and the ultimate theme of Friedman's challenging, provocative book -- essential reading for all who care about how the world really works.

E-Consumerism as a Tool for Empowerment

I have found an interesting paper regarding Consumer Empowerment with Title
"E-Consumerism as a Tool for Empowerment"in the internet. The authors of the paper have defined the e-consumerism as "actions of consumers or their agents to protect and promote consumer interest and seek empowerment in the context of the electronic market place". The paper has also divided consuemr purchasing cycle in the context of E-consumerism in three sections. They are E-Consumerism in the Pre-purchase Stage of Consumption, E-Consumerism in the Purchase Stage of Consumption, E-Consumerism in the Post Purchase Stage of Consumption. The authors have recommended creating "Conumer Networks" among consumers through e-mail and discussion lists, Usenet, Bulleti Board Systems (BBS) and chat rooms. By doing so, consumers can empower themselves as well as become countervailing power against sellers. Thus consumers will be benefitted from the immensed power of internet which has brought great opportunity for consumers to become guiding force in the e-business.

http://www-agecon.ag.ohio-state.edu/programs/e-agbiz/pagepapersandpres/papers_presentations/jce.pdf

How about managing your own electronic medical records?

A few weeks back I listened to an interview on the BBC in which a maimed Iraq war veteran complained that he was not able to get medical help from the State (US governemnt) as his Medical Records went missing. He narated that after he was injured, before his flight out of Iraq, the medical officer put his records on his bed and told him to hold on to them. He doesn't remeber how they went missing during the journey home. He has failed to trace them or copies of them.

When I stumbled across this article http://edition.cnn.com/2007/TECH/10/05/microsoft.healthvault.ap/index.html on CNN about Microsoft new website for managing personal health and medical information, the war veteran was not far from my mind. How much easier would it be if he had both electronic and paper records. He would not need to move with the paper ones.

The artilce says, and I quote, "The free site can store medical histories, immunization and other records from doctors' offices and hospital visits, including data from devices like heart monitors. It is also tied to a health information search engine the software maker launched last month.
Users can dole out access to different slices of their health data via e-mailed invitations to doctors, family members and other people as the need arises".

Wouldn't it be great to be able to manage your own health records. Each time you Visit a doctor, you have upload the details onto your profile. No need to carry medical history when you relocate or are attended to by another. You simply give access to certain information to your new physician or other concerned parties.

I know electronic health management systems have been treated with a lot of scepticism as they bring in issues of possible inappropriate disclosure of confidential or sensitive details. But I really feel such systems will simply keeping of records and help in making more informed diagnoses of conditions.

Check out the health vault http://www.healthvault.com/