More »

On the ColderICE Facebook discussion boards I have asked the simple question; How do you use Social sites to support your business?

There really is NO right or wrong answer here, it is the open question of the week. Do you use it? Should you use it? Should you NOT use it? WHY?

Sure all of the "so-called" savviest in social media experts have a say, LMAO. But it really boils down to the business owners. Is social marketing a tool that you will use? If so how? If not, why not?

Screw the masses, what do YOU think. It is possibly one of the most important topics and it has a vast area of differentiation.

Let me here what you think, simply CLICK HERE and join the discussion.

Post from: ColderICE eCommerce Video Blog

Let’s Start The Social Marketing Discussion: Do You or Don’t You?!?

Related posts:

1. Social Marketing: My Theory of Flowers and Bees Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
2. Is Social Twist The BEST eCommerce Social Marketing Tool I have Seen??? Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
3. We Started Social Marketing :: I Am eBay Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...

More »

comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR) , a leader in measuring the digital world, today released findings from a study of the impact of holiday promotions on PayPal’s use at major online retailers during the 2008 holiday season. As merchants and payment services prepare for a competitive 2009 holiday season, understanding the lifts from prior promotions is critical in assembling marketing programs that positively impact consumer preferences and drive share.

The results of the comScore study show that PayPal promotions launched in Q4 2008 caused a significant increase in the payment method’s share of dollars spent at major retailer sites, including Overstock.com, Walmart.com and others, as consumers capitalized on attractive online deals. These and other relevant findings are covered in detail in the comScore report, Alternative Payment Types Online: The Rise and Maturity of PayPal and Others Across the e-Commerce Landscape, which is currently available for purchase.

Holiday Promotions Drive Increase in PayPal Dollar Share

During Q4 2008, PayPal announced attractive promotions at several online retailer sites resulting in significant increases in its dollar share among partner retailer sites. Overstock.com customers were presented with 15 percent cash back on a $100 purchase when using PayPal, which helped push its dollar share up 3.6 percentage points to 18.6 percent. Walmart.com, which launched its partnership with PayPal in early October 2008, offered $20 off a purchase of $50 or greater when customers used a PayPal account to checkout, resulting in a 9.0 percent dollar share during Q4. Dell.com gave PayPal preferential treatment, positioning the payment option right under Dell’s payment plan and above all other credit card options, helping to boost PayPal’s share to 7.0 percent in Q4 2008, an increase of 5.1 percentage points from the previous quarter.

  PayPal Share of Dollars at Online Retailer Site
  Q4 2008 vs. Q3 2008
  Total U.S. Home/Work/University Locations
  Source: comScore, Inc.
  ----------------------
                           Dollar Share
                           ------------
                                              Point
                       Q3 2008   Q4 2008     Change
                       -------   -------     ------
  Overstock.com           15.0%     18.6%       3.6
  ------------            ----      ----        ---
  Walmart.com              N/A*      9.0%       N/A
  -----------              ---       ---        ---
  Dell.com                 1.9%      7.0%       5.1
  --------                 ---       ---        ---
  AE.com                   3.0%      8.0%       5.0
  ------                   ---       ---        ---

  *PayPal payment option was not implemented until October 2008 at
   Walmart.com

"PayPal’s aggressive promotion strategy during the 2008 holiday season helped the popular online payment method carve out a significantly higher share of wallet at several major retailer sites," said Matt Archer, comScore senior manager, financial services. "Despite the limited duration of the promotions, PayPal has managed to retain a notable share of wallet at most of these retailer sites in subsequent time periods.

As merchants and payment services make decisions related to 2009 holiday promotions, the positive impact of prior programs in growing share of dollars and transactions represents critical information."

Post from: ColderICE eCommerce Video Blog

Press Release: Paypal Gets Holiday Season Promotion Boost

Related posts:

1. Microsoft Sites Captures Largest Share of Time Spent Online Worldwide Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
2. Press Release: ChannelAdvisor Reports Significant Third Quarter Customer Additions and New Profitability Milestone Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
3. Press Release: Win $1000 in the Bidtopia “The Big Deal” Contest Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...

More »

Rupert Murdoch, the head of News Corporation, is prepared to remove his company’s content from Google’ search index “within months” as the pay versus free content debate reaches crisis point. The tension is RISING and Mr. Murdoch is amping up. This is a heavyweight championship battle royal.

When asked how long it would be before Mr Murdoch took the step to block Google, which every media company relies upon to send them high levels of web traffic, Murdoch said it would be soon – “months and quarters – not weeks”.

Let’s refresh our memories again….REWIND A full decade after Napster taught the world to share, the music industry’s resistance to new business models continues to obstruct what could preserve it. Napster, created by a college kid to share music with other kids in his dorm, is long gone, and yet file sharing continues to shape the musical landscape.

The RIAA fight with Napster ended with the RIAA spending MILLIONS trying to block sharing using lawsuits against parents of teens (dumb ass move), investing in watermarking techniques (that $#&% didn’t work) and disbanding Napster (good move for Kazaa, Bearshare, Blubster and on and on). Just like a Greek Hydra, you cut off 1 head and 3 more grow out.

Is Mr. Murdoch STUPID? That is my question today? Probably not, he is just OLD! LMAO

Please Rate My Video with 5-Stars DSR’s

Post from: ColderICE eCommerce Video Blog

Stupid Is As Stupid Does: Is Rupert Murdoch Stupid?

Related posts:

1. The Wednesday WAVE from Google?!? Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
2. Google Announces New Product Listing Ads: The GIANT Awakes! Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
3. Google Wants To Make The Web 2x FASTER: Hell YEAH! Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...

More »

Over on the Chromium Google Blog Google announced a project called SPDY!

Today we’d like to share with the web community information about SPDY, pronounced "SPeeDY", an early-stage research project that is part of our effort to make the web faster. SPDY is at its core an application-layer protocol for transporting content over the web. It is designed specifically for minimizing latency through features such as multiplexed streams, request prioritization and HTTP header compression.

We started working on SPDY while exploring ways to optimize the way browsers and servers communicate. Today, web clients and servers speak HTTP. HTTP is an elegantly simple protocol that emerged as a web standard in 1996 after a series of experiments. HTTP has served the web incredibly well. We want to continue building on the web’s tradition of experimentation and optimization, to further support the evolution of websites and browsers. So over the last few months, a few of us here at Google have been experimenting with new ways for web browsers and servers to speak to each other, resulting in a prototype web server and Google Chrome client with SPDY support.

So far we have only tested SPDY in lab conditions. The initial results are very encouraging: when we download the top 25 websites over simulated home network connections, we see a significant improvement in performance - pages loaded up to 55% faster. There is still a lot of work we need to do to evaluate the performance of SPDY in real-world conditions. However, we believe that we have reached the stage where our small team could benefit from the active participation, feedback and assistance of the web community.

Post from: ColderICE eCommerce Video Blog

Google Wants To Make The Web 2x FASTER: Hell YEAH!

Related posts:

1. Google Chrome Releases FASTER Beta Version w/ Bookmarking Upgrades Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
2. Start Your Own Google Store w/ Google Checkout and Google Store Gadget Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
3. RUMOR Flash! : Google Probes DEEP Into eBay and Ecommerce Territories! Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...

More »

Google announces a new feature for sponsored listing links. This indicates that online retailers can now launch all of their products in the Google Merchant Center account and only pay a fee when someone purchases something from their shopping cart. Consumers will begin to see these product listings ads more frequently they move into the peak of the holiday shopping season.

“Everyday we come across many users come to Google.com to research products and find where to buy them,” says Google’s Dan Friedman. “To better serve these users, we have been testing a new feature of AdWords called Product Listing Ads. Product Listing Ads works with an advertiser’s Google Merchant Center account to serve highly targeted ads that include richer product information directly in the ad itself — including product image, price, and merchant name.”

Global search leader Google has recently been engaged in experimenting its new “Product Listing Ads” ad format with several online retailers as a new model to get paid search ads featuring product images in Google.com search results, and yesterday, the company announced that they are beginning to expand their product listings ads beta program to more merchants — just in time for the holiday shopping season.

Product Listing Ads is part of Google’s effort to simplify the advertising process for merchants with large product inventories. Some of the key features of Product Listing Ads include:

• Pay only for results: Product Listing Ads are charged on a cost-per-action (CPA) basis, which means that you only pay when a user clicks on your ad and completes a purchase on your site. Because Product Listing Ads is charged on a CPA basis, it offers a risk-free way for you to reach a larger audience on Google.com.
• List your entire inventory: Product Listing Ads requires no keywords or additional ad text. Whenever a user enters a search query relevant to an item in your Google Merchant Center account, Google will automatically show the most relevant products along with the associated image, price and product name. Product Listing Ads makes it easy for you to promote your entire product inventory on Google.com.

At this time, Product Listing Ads is still a beta feature and is only available to a limited number of retail advertisers. Over time, they will increase the number of users who see Product Listing Ads as well as the number of advertisers able to participate.

A large number of ecommerce sites typically employ some sort of pay per click marketing in their overall advertising plan. With the latest release, online retailers can become more efficient and move beyond the click based pricing model to a cost per action pricing model.

Post from: ColderICE eCommerce Video Blog

Google Announces New Product Listing Ads: The GIANT Awakes!

Related posts:

1. Press Release: Google Product Search Teams With Marketplaces Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
2. Google Product Search (Google Base Feed) Best Practices Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
3. RUMOR Flash! : Google Probes DEEP Into eBay and Ecommerce Territories! Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...

More »

Earlier this year I was so fortunate to have an opportunity to meet and interview Liz Strauss for this blog.

For those "in the know" the name Liz Strauss of Successful-Blog.com has the ability to make a room gasp and swoon, LMAO.

Seriously, when Liz talks people don’t just listen, they CAPTURE it and internalize it. Liz KNOWS what we all need to learn to be successful bloggers.

Thanks to a post on The Freelance Writing Jobs Network, I found out about Liz being hospitalized and like SO MANY Americans who are self employed, Liz did NOT have health care coverage for this unfortunate event.

As Deb (from her blog) points out…

Healthcare reform hasn’t happened. An uninsured hospital stay for a blogger is a nightmare none of us wants to face-but our friend Liz didn’t have a choice. In lieu of flowers we hope you will chip in to defray the cost of her hospital stay. If everyone donated the price of a Latte we could set her back on the track to financial health as well a physical health.

My best wishes go out to Liz for a speedy recovery. If you can chip in, please do!!!

Oh and while I am on this point…Liz is NOT an illegal alien, unwed teen mother, she does NOT live in a trailer park and she is NOT a socialist… This could be one of dozens of self employed people that I know personally that do not have healthcare, any of us could have health needs one day.

THINK for yourself!

Post from: ColderICE eCommerce Video Blog

I Adore Liz Strauss and HATE The Health Care Debate!

Related posts:

1. Is Your Blog Kick Ass? Take Notes From the Queen “SOB” Liz Strauss Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
2. Twitter Re-Caps from @ColderICE, 04.21.09 Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
3. An Interesting Look At the ‘Pulse’ of America Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...

More »

The latest eDigitalResearch eRetail Benchmark Study reveals that traditional retailers are now consistently outperforming their pure play and traditional catalogue rivals online, using multi channel technology and customer service expertise to their advantage.

  Now in its 10^th year, the index surveyed 46 of retail’s top performing websites, using eDigitalResearch’s unique eMysteryShopper tool to evaluate each site based on the entire customer journey, from first impressions to shopping basket, purchase, delivery and supporting communications.

However, when it comes to functionality, most traditional retailers can still learn a thing or two from their pure play counterparts.  Amazon, in particular, was applauded for its ‘Google style’ predictive text keyword search, quick and easy transaction process and product reviews while ASOS’s  (Asos.com) information, images and catwalk video’s scored well.  Both Amazon and ASOS made it into the top ten overall performers.

Ten years ago the ‘pure play’ ecommerce operators ruled when it came to selling online.  However, slowly but surely, multi channel retailers have chipped away at their advantage,"

While ‘bricks and mortar’ retailers have always held the customer service advantage, they are now gaining commercial advantage too, investing in technology and integration across multiple purchasing channels.  If they continue to embrace new media channels while delivering a traditional ethos of exceeding customer expectations then multi channel retailers stand a good chance of running their pure play counterparts out of the market.

–  eDigitalResearch’s Head of Research Derek Eccleston.

To the above conclusion, I say…bullsh*t, but that is just my opinion. However I do see the space getting very crowded in the next 2 years. Retailers will NOT be satisfied with just selling their stuff and splitting fees and customer base with sales platforms like eBay and Amazon.

Ultimately these retailers WILL compete directly. Who will win the battle? That is a fight I will watch very close.

Post from: ColderICE eCommerce Video Blog

Amazon vs. Wal-Mart: Will Retailers Outperforming Pure Play eCommerce?!?

Related posts:

1. Product Release: ChannelAdvisor Launches New Amazon Solution Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
2. Amazon Gives FBA Sellers a Nice CASH Credit for Holiday Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
3. Amazon Strategies Blog Has Been Launched by ChannelAdvisor CEO Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...

More »

There are people who will tell you that it is possible to create a viral campaign that will
certainly be a hit, and there are agencies specializing in taking money and making promises.
But I’ve noticed that when organizations (and their agencies) set out to go viral, the vast
majority of their campaigns fail.

It is virtually impossible to create a Web marketing program that is guaranteed to go viral; it requires a huge amount of luck and timing. That’s an important point to remember as you work on viral marketing ideas, because it’s unlike the old-rules, numbers-based marketing
techniques you’re probably used to. Consider a direct mail campaign: You could always count on a direct mail piece to generate a known number of responses, say 2 percent. So if you needed to have 100 people respond, you sent out 5,000 mailers. Easy, right?

Viral marketing is much different. You just can’t count on numbers in the same way. Many efforts fail miserably, and there are countless Web sites, e-books, and videos that only their creators’ mothers and bosses have seen. However, tomorrow those same marketers might get lucky and get a million people to view their content, driving tens of thousands of people’s interest in their products and services.

However, this importance of timing and luck shouldn’t discourage you from using viral
marketing techniques; you just need to learn how to turn the odds in your favor.

This is an except from David Meerman Scott I just need to say I agree 1000%

Post from: ColderICE eCommerce Video Blog

You Can NOT Make A Viral Video

Related posts:

1. Killer Milestones: 100,000 YouTube Views & 70,000 eBay Feedback Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
2. Biz Minute Video: Google Adwords Optimization Strategies My personal goal for 2009 is to become more proficient...
3. Intrusion to Engagement— A Marketing Shift Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...

More »

In September 2009, nearly 27 billion hours were spent on the Internet globally by a record online population of 1.2 billion Internet users age 15 and older. Microsoft Sites accounted for 14.5 percent of total minutes spent online in September, making it the most engaging global property, with Microsoft’s Windows Live Messenger representing nearly 70 percent of time spent on the property during the month.

Google Sites captured 9.3 percent of total minutes (2.5 billion hours), with YouTube accounting for nearly half of total time spent (1.2 billion hours) at the property. Yahoo! Sites ranked as the third most engaging Web property at 1.7 billion hours, followed by Facebook.com at 1.4 billion hours. Facebook’s share of attention reached 5.1 percent in September, an increase of 2.9 percentage points from the previous year, as its continued growth in popularity precipitated this surge in share.

  Top Global Properties Based on Total Hours
  September 2009 vs. September 2008
  Total Audience Age 15+ at Home/Work Locations*
  Source: comScore World Metrix
  -----------------------------
                                         Total Hours (MM)
                                         ---------------
                                Sep-2008        Sep-2009      % Change
                                --------        --------      --------
  Total Internet : Total
   Audience                       21,746          26,988            24
  ----------------------          ------          ------           ---
  Microsoft Sites                  2,734           3,920            43
  ---------------                  -----           -----           ---
  Google Sites                     1,703           2,512            48
  ------------                     -----           -----           ---
  Yahoo! Sites                     1,975           1,699           -14
  ------------                     -----           -----           ---
  Facebook.com                       474           1,387           193
  ------------                       ---           -----           ---
  Tencent Inc.                       589             893            52
  ------------                       ---             ---           ---
  AOL LLC                            584             513           -12
  -------                            ---             ---           ---
  eBay                               231             239             3
  ----                               ---             ---           ---
  Fox Interactive Media              361             204           -44
  ---------------------              ---             ---           ---
  Baidu.com Inc.                     175             163            -7
  --------------                     ---             ---           ---
  Lycos Sites                         59             107            81
  -----------                        ---             ---           ---

  *Excludes visitation from public computers such as Internet cafes or
  access from mobile phones or PDAs.

  Global Regions Exhibit Different Preferences at Top Online Brands

A regional analysis of the top global properties in time spent by their visitors revealed different preferences across global markets. Microsoft Sites held the largest share of time spent among the top worldwide properties in Europe (16.8 percent), Latin America (35.9 percent) and the Middle East - Africa (33.1 percent). Yahoo! Sites captured the largest share of time in North America with 11.2 percent share, while also attracting a notable 7.9-percent share of time spent in the Asia Pacific region. Google Sites commanded a strong share of time spent in Latin America (19.4 percent), Middle East - Africa (9.7 percent), Europe (9.6 percent) and North America (9.1 percent). China’s Tencent Inc. captured the largest share of visitors’ time in Asia Pacific with a 10.7-percent share, but had negligible engagement in other worldwide regions.

  Share of Time Spent at Top 5 Global Properties Based on Total Minutes
  September 2009
  Total Audience Age 15+ at Home/Work Locations*
  Source: comScore World Metrix
  -----------------------------

                     Share (%) of Total Time Spent Online in Region
                     ----------------------------------------------
                                                                    Middle
                              North              Asia      Latin    East -
                 Worldwide   America   Europe   Pacific   America   Africa
                 ---------   -------   ------   -------   -------   ------
  Microsoft Sites  14.5%       8.6%     16.8%     6.4%      35.9%    33.1%
  ---------------  ----        ---      ----      ---       ----     ----
  Google Sites      9.3%       9.1%      9.6%     6.4%      19.4%     9.7%
  ------------      ---        ---       ---      ---       ----      ---
  Yahoo! Sites      6.3%      11.2%      2.0%     7.9%       2.1%     4.9%
  ------------      ---       ----       ---      ---        ---      ---
  Facebook.com      5.1%       6.0%      6.6%     2.4%       5.0%     8.0%
  ------------      ---        ---       ---      ---        ---      ---
  Tencent Inc.      3.3%       0.0%      0.0%    10.7%       0.0%     0.0%
  ------------      ---        ---       ---     ----        ---      ---

  *Excludes visitation from public computers such as Internet cafes or
  access from mobile phones or PDAs.

"The Internet continues to be a dynamic and growing environment around the world with the global online population climbing more than 20 percent in the last year," said Jack Flanagan, executive vice president of comScore Media Metrix. "With the U.S. economy only now emerging from a recession, many multinational corporations have shifted the focus of their growth strategies towards developing markets and the Internet represents an important aspect of those strategies. Understanding the global Internet landscape is the first step towards executing effective marketing strategies in these growing markets."

Post from: ColderICE eCommerce Video Blog

Microsoft Sites Captures Largest Share of Time Spent Online Worldwide

Related posts:

1. Press Release: Paypal Gets Holiday Season Promotion Boost Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
2. Tying my online presence together with Storytlr.com Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
3. Google Fast Flip: An Online Magazine You Customize Yourself Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...

More »

It looking like the consumer is not in love with his credit cards anymore. What’s in your wallet? CASH! In these times of job loss, insecurity, rising interest rates and big balances, the urge to buy now pay later is declining. Buyer are beginning to favor cash and debit cards more and more.

The findings, based on the Consumer Intentions and Actions survey, suggest that consumers are making strides in the quest to reset the spend button and relearn the concept of living within their means.

According the September 2009 consumer survey by BIGresearch, 17 percent of consumers report that they are currently using their credit cards more to pay for gasoline than they were 12 months earlier, “that figure represents a sharp drop from the 25 percent who reported the same in September 2008,” he says. Additionally, when asked about the plastic they now keep in their wallets, “percentages were down for all major credit cards as well as store credit cards.”

Post from: ColderICE eCommerce Video Blog

Consumers Are Spending Less on Credit This Year

Related posts:

1. The Real Deal: How to Get Your Credit Reports FREE, No Gimmicks Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
2. Business Money Basics: Understanding & Improving Your Credit Score Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...
3. Hackers Hit Credit Card Information From Network Solutions for Months, WTF? Share this article...Close Bookmark and Share This Page Save to Browser...