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Fewer than one-third of leading online retailers are ready for tablets

Friday, February 17th, 2012

tablet computers

Fewer than one-third of retailers have optimized sites for tablet commerce. Most are simply relying on their standard websites to provide an “adequate enough” tablet shopping experience, according to a new report.

Zmags, a provider of rich media mobile and social merchandising, today released results of a research report entitled, “Mobile & Tablet e-Commerce: Is anyone really ready?”

Zmags commissioned HawkPartners, a marketing consulting and research firm, to assess the mobile and tablet offerings of the Top 100 Internet retailers, who were evaluated on the shopping and purchasing experiences they provided across tablets (iPad), smartphones (iPhone and Android) and Facebook.

“What we discovered, unexpectedly, was that very few retailers—even among this elite group of marketers—are tapping into the full shopping potential of mobile and tablet devices. In fact, not even close to it,” said W. Sean Ford, COO and CMO of Zmags.

“Only one quarter of retailers are ready to take a consumer through checkout over tablets, but forty-nine percent of today’s tablet owners said they plan to shop even more next year using their device. This reflects a serious disconnect between how consumers want to shop and the inconsistent experiences they are being offered. It’s a crucial issue that retailers need to address before their competitors do.”

Other key findings include:

  • More than half of retailers have developed smartphone-specific offerings to provide key functionality for the smaller screen.
  • While more than two-thirds of the retailers have developed iPhone apps, only half of that group offers the ability to purchase via the app.
  • All 100 retailers have Facebook brand pages, but only one (Coldwater Creek) lets consumers directly purchase from the Facebook page.
  • The research identified three retailers (Gilt Groupe, Disney and Urban Outfitters) as having the strongest and most robust mobile offerings across most devices and channels.
  • Only 19 of the top 100 retailers extended beyond ordinary HTML-type content to include more engaging material such as look books, catalogs, editorial picks, etc. However, none of them extended the dynamic environment or optimized the brand experience across the full range of smartphones, tablets and Facebook.
  • An interactive multimedia summary of the research is available at http://www.zmags.com/blog/new-research-report-mobile-tablet-commerce-is-anyone-really-ready

A full research report, entitled “”Mobile & Tablet e-Commerce: Is anyone really ready?”can be downloaded atwww.zmags.com/top100.
All results are based on the research conducted over a 4-week period in November and December 2011.

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Connect with 60 high growth tech companies at the Southeast Venture Conference

Tuesday, February 14th, 2012

Sevc 2012Make connections with 60 showcase high growth technology companies from the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic as they present to hundreds of executives from the region’s innovation, entrepreneurial and venture communities,  at the Southeast Venture Conference February 29th – March 1st at the Ritz-Carlton in Tysons Corner, Virginia.

In addition to presenting companies and hours of executive networking – the conference will feature a speaker line up including Netflix co-founder and former CEO, Marc Randolphand includes dozens of leading venture capital investors from groups like Lightbank and NEA; industry insiders from organizations including Bloomberg, Motley Fool and theNational Venture Capital Association; and other successful entrepreneurs such asOpenTable founder, Chuck Templeton.

This year’s presenting company line-up includes:

Register today to guarantee your space at the region’s premiere venture forum!

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Southeast Venture Conference names 2nd round of presenting companies

Wednesday, February 8th, 2012

Sevc 2012The Southeast Venture Conference has announced the second round of presenters for the 2012 SEVC, one of the largest venture events in the Southeast, taking place at the Ritz-Carlton in Tysons Corner, Virginia, Feb 29th-Mar 1st.

The second round of showcase presenters include:

For a list of the first round of presenting companies selected, see: First round of presenting companies.
Things VCs never tell you about raising money (based on a presentation by Marc Gorlin, chair of Kabbage, which is also presenting at this year’s SEVC.

SEVC has sold out every year, register early to reserve your spot!

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Smaller banks face widening gap in mobile banking

Monday, February 6th, 2012

Javelin Strategy & ResearchThere is a a widening gap between mobile banking adoption rates at smaller banks and credit unions compared to larger financial institutions.

Only 21% of consumers at regional and community banks and 15% of consumers at credit unions use mobile banking versus 37% of consumers at giant banks. Mobile banking is growing rapidly, jumping by 63% since last year and fueled by smartphone adoption, according to Javelin Strategy & Research’s latest report.

Only 21% of consumers at regional and community banks and 15% of consumers at credit unions use mobile banking versus 37% of consumers at giant banks. Mobile banking is growing rapidly, jumping by 63% since last year and fueled by smartphone adoption.

As tablets have exploded onto the scene, promising to transform mobile banking once again, smaller FIs will continue to fall behind, unless they change their strategies to improve their offerings and capture a solid customer base of mobile bankers.

Javelin’s latest mobile channel forecast addresses how banks and credit unions can position themselves to succeed as mobile banking institutions and keep pace with larger FIs.“Mobile Banking, Smartphone and Tablet Forecast 2011-2016: Mobile Banking Moves Mainstream to Mid-sized, Community Banks, and Credit Unions”

More than half of consumers will do mobile banking

More than 50% of consumers are expected to become mobile bankers by 2016. With 92% of the top 25 banks now offering mobile banking, smaller banks and credit unions risk losing valuable customers — especially smartphone and tablet customers — to these institutions and must focus on building out their mobile banking capabilities in order to compete.

“The key challenge for smaller FIs is attracting the right demographics,” said Mary Monahan, executive VP and Research Director, Mobile at Javelin. “The typical mobile banking customer is young (ages 18 through 44), ethnic (typically Asian, Latino, or African American), and high income (earning more than $75K).

Customers at regional and community banks and credit unions are significantly older, less wealthy, Caucasian, and less tech-savvy. FIs must broaden their services, appeal to a wider range of demographics, and attract new clients if they want to succeed.”

“Smaller banks and credit unions have always prided themselves on providing superior customer service, so they cannot continue to ignore the mobile channel,” said Jim Van Dyke, president, Javelin.

“Resource-constrained institutions should focus initially on the browser method, currently used by a majority of mobile consumers. It is the most cost-effective and easiest to deploy. However, these FIs need to focus future efforts on developing app and SMS text banking to appeal to a broader array of users and technology.”

Javelin’s “Mobile Banking, Smartphone and Tablet Forecast 2011-2016: Mobile Banking Moves Mainstream to Mid-sized, Community Banks, and Credit Unions” report highlights mobile channel trends, identifies the roadblocks and drivers for mobile banking, (including smartphone and tablet users) and outlines strategies that community and regional banks and credit unions can use to boost consumer adoption of SMS text, downloadable apps and browser-based mobile banking.

The report is based on surveys with 15 mobile banking vendors, a review of 23 FIs with mobile banking offerings, and survey data collected online from more than 17,400 consumers.

Selected Key Report Findings –Mobile Channel Forecast

  • Mobile is now the top communication channel. Mobile usage is surpassing online usage.
  • Consumers’ use of mobile banking rose dramatically in 2011. Jumping by 63%, 57 million U.S. adults conducted mobile banking in 2011, increasing 63% over 2010.
  • Consumers use an assortment of channels for mobile banking. Most consumers continue to access their mobile banking accounts through the browser, a financial habit established through online banking. At the nation’s largest banks, where the triple play, that is, mobile banking through browsers, apps, and SMS text, is offered, this tendency flips: More customers use apps and SMS than browsers.

 

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One in five Americans affected by online stalking

Tuesday, January 24th, 2012

Stop Think ConnectOne in five (19%) Americans have come in contact with someone online who made them feel uncomfortable through stalking, persistent emails, and other aggressive outreach attempts, according to new data from the National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA) and McAfee in time for Stalking Awareness Month this January.

The study, conducted by Zogby International, also revealed that two-fifths (39%) of those victims reported the incident while 61% remained silent.

January is National Stalking Awareness Month, a time to focus on a crime that affects 3.4 million victims a year.

This year’s theme, “Stalking: Know It. Name It. Stop It.” challenges the nation to fight this dangerous crime by learning more about it.

The Stalking Resource Center of the National Center for Victims of Crime states that one in four victims report that the stalker uses a variety of technologies, such as computers, global positioning system (GPS) devices, or hidden cameras, to track the victim’s daily activities.

Stalking is a crime in all 50 states and the District of Columbia, but it is often difficult to recognize, investigate, and prosecute. Unlike other crimes, stalking is not a single, easily identifiable crime but a series of acts, a course of conduct directed at a specific person that would cause that person fear.  Stalking may take many forms, such as assaults, threats, vandalism, burglary, or animal abuse, as well as unwanted cards, calls, gifts, or visits.

“The Internet is an amazing tool for sharing and connecting with people. Unfortunately, there are some people who will use it to track, harass or make unwanted contact. Stalking can be dangerous and should be taken seriously,” said Michael Kaiser, executive director of the National Cyber Security Alliance.

“We encourage anyone who believes they are being victimized online to report the crime and seek help, if needed, from law enforcement or a victim service provider.”

“Cyber criminals are more resourceful than ever. This data supports an ever-increasing need for online users to be vigilant in their actions each day,” said John Thode, executive vice president, consumer, mobile and small business, McAfee. “Americans must be educated to recognize the signs of stalking and other forms of cyber crime as well as taking action to protect ourselves, our youth, and our digital infrastructure from victimization.”

Ten tips on avoiding online stalkers.

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Are you a geek, a nerd or neither? (infographic)

Friday, January 6th, 2012

BigBang Theory

The Big Bang Theory pokes fun at super smart "geeks" who love science, comic books and the girl next door.

Finally, you can answer the burning question, are you a geek, a nerd or neither?

Personally, we have mixed traits, although we do like this statement cited as nerd-talk, “I would love to change the world but they won’t give me the source code.”

We think there is some confusion generally about what constitutes a nerd. The TV show “The Big Bang Theory,” for instance, suggests that nerdy  university scientists are rabid comic book fans. Some may be, but as much as we enjoy the show, we doubt its premise.

The folks at Masters in IT, created this infographic to help you decide where you fit on the geek/nerd scale:

 

Geek-nerd infographic

If you found the text hard to read on Geek/Nerd traits, here it is: 

Geek Traits:
Someone with a specifc niche interest/lifestyle that they have become the expert on
A fan of gadgets
An early adopter
A Mac
Wears ironic t-shirts
Can be pretentious and longwinded
Knowledge can range from mundane to “living encyclopedia” status
Interests might include gaming, film (both artsy and anything Will Ferrel stars in), collecting, gadgets/tech, computing, coding, hacking, techno music, screen printing, etc. 

Likely geek jobs:
Web design/development
IT professional
Marketer
Graphic designer
Game designer/developer
Barista at an indie coffee shop
Entrepreneur
Record store
Bartender 

Nerd Traits:
Extreme interest or fascination with academics
Introverted
Socially Inept
Diverse and sometimes impractical skillets due to broad interests in games, movies, science, computers, etc.
A PC
Interest might include: Battlestar Galactica (BSG), LARPing, SecondLife, Physics, Chess, Fantasy/Sci-Fi, Computer programming 

Likely nerd jobs:
Rocket scientist
Reclusive and renowned professor
Computer programmer
Engineer
IT professional
Inventor
Or work at a video store

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7 tips to boost your optimism for the New Year

Monday, January 2nd, 2012

Jamie DePeau, chief marketing officer at Lincoln Financial.

Nearly half of all Americans make a New Year’s resolution each year, but only a small fraction follow through. To increase your chances of successfully adopting a more optimistic outlook in 2012, consider taking control of your life with small, simple actions.

Lincoln Financial Group’s new MOOD (Measuring Optimism, Outlook and Direction) survey identified the secrets of optimistic and empowered people.  The results revealed that those who take charge of their lives are more likely to have an optimistic outlook on life.

In fact, according to the MOOD findings, 66 percent of Americans feel in control of their lives and believe their lives are headed in the right direction. So what is it about these optimistic people that eludes the rest of us?

It seems the secret is not about having more, but about doing more with what you have—be that resources, family or time – and engaging with those around you. For example, start the New Year by making more time for those you care most about.  MOOD revealed that this is a key trait exhibited by Americans who feel in control.

Grand resolutions unsustainable

Start working this into your daily life by hosting family dinners, helping kids with homework, making time for friends and using social media to cultivate relationships.  Another way to feel empowered and have a positive impact on those around you is to volunteer in your community.

“Grand resolutions, such as exercising an hour five days a week, are often unsustainable and can wind up making us feel very frustrated,” said Jamie DePeau, Chief Marketing Officer at Lincoln Financial.

“That’s why it’s so important to highlight that optimistic people often start small.   Indeed, MOOD has shown us that these people take very specific actions to achieve success, often through small, daily behaviors.  Simple steps such as balancing your checkbook or taking the stairs instead of the elevator can lower stress, lift your belief in your own potential, and eventually get you on the road to having an optimistic outlook on life.”

So before making a resolution to clean out your entire garage or tackle overflowing piles of laundry in one fell swoop, consider the Top 7 behaviors of those who feel in control of their lives.

According to MOOD, these Americans:

1.      Cultivate relationships with friends and family and use social media to engage with those they care about

2.      Volunteer in their communities and contribute to charitable organizations

3.      Take quiet time to be alone and think

4.      Exercise

5.      Spend time on a hobby

6.      Save a little money from each paycheck regardless of the amount and adhere to a budget

7.      Own a retirement account and financial products such as life insurance, annuities or educational savings accounts

“The great news is that you don’t necessarily need to make monumental changes to take charge of your life.  A few simple steps can be empowering and put you in control of your destiny,” adds DePeau.

“Finances can feel overwhelming. Rather than making a lofty, and potentially unattainable, New Year’s goal, we are hoping to inspire Americans to adopt some of the principals of optimistic Americans, which include building savings and investing in their financial security as a whole.”

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Top brands creating Google+ pages in increasing numbers

Thursday, December 22nd, 2011

Starbucks BrightEdge,a search and social management platform for global enterprises, says that Google+ page creation amongst the world’s top 100 brands jumped in the last month from 61 percent to 77 percent. while the number of people in circles increased over 50 percent from 147,000 to 222,000.

Compare that to Facebook (93 percent of top 100 brands are on Facebook)

It is still early days as top 100 brands determine how best to establish a Google+ presence, while continuing to attract more people in circles.  Google continues to have the largest fan contingent of any brand with more than 77k fans, up from 65k just one month before.

Starbucks quadruped its social followers

Brands like Starbucks nearly quadrupled their social followers in the last month and H&M and Pepsi broke into 20k plus people in circles, which is still a shadow of the millions of Facebook fans these brands have already connected with.

In fact, a review of Facebook and Google+ properties for all top 100 brands, showed a collective total of almost 300 million Facebook fans for these top brands, compared to approximately 148k Google+ followers for these same brands.

“Google is embedding their popular new product with its dominant search marketing position, replicating the tie between social and search channels, just as Facebook’s Open Graph tied sites and search together earlier this year, blurring the lines between social and search engagement,” said Jim Yu, CEO of BrightEdge.

“Top 100 brands are realizing that they now need to address both channels. Now the real work begins, if they want to extend their social presence on the Web from Facebook to the new Google+.”

To learn more about the Google+ analysis, please visit BrightEdge SocialShare to view and download the full report here:http://www.brightedge.com/resources.

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Baby boomers want to leave a “personal legacy”

Thursday, December 22nd, 2011
bookLegacy Keepers, the only nationwide complete legacy preservation service, has released “Filling in the Legacy Gap,” a white paper that addresses the Baby Boomer generation’s strong desire to preserve an emotional legacy.

Baby boomers want to leave a ” personal legacy” that goes beyond just a will and an inheritance, says a study.

Based on a landmark study sponsored by Allianz Insurance, the white paper examines the shift from the cultural norm of primarily leaving just financial preparations for future generations, to leaving a more complete legacy.

Additionally, it indicates that the interest in preserving a personal legacy is a growing interest, one that will likely gain traction with future generations.

“Technology and social media have made the dissemination of personal information a mainstay in the modern lifestyle—it only makes sense that that mindset would be present as people begin to think about their own mortality,” said Corina Kellam, director for Legacy Keepers. “Simply preparing a will just won’t cut it; people and their families are looking for more.”

This growing desire for personal legacy preservation has opened up an entirely new service industry Boomers are eager to utilize. To address this need, Legacy Keepers built a nationwide network of personal historians who work with individuals or loved ones to compile the information needed to succinctly capture a personal legacy.

These stories are then complied and preserved as a professionally edited Legacy Book, high-definition DVD or audio CD set.

“There is a clear distinction between an inheritance and a legacy, and we’ve found it’s not just assets and wealth that retirement-aged people are looking to pass down to their kin,” said Keith Ogorek, senior vice-president of Legacy Keepers and author of the “Filling in the Legacy Gap” white paper.

To read the complete “Filling in the Legacy Gap” white paper or for more information about the original Allianz study, see: http://bit.ly/n5rW9D.

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How to reach the huge audience of lonely consumers:market online

Thursday, December 15th, 2011

StanfordAs we embark on another holiday season, we’re once again deluged by images of groups of happy people socializing. But a large number of us will be facing the biggest shopping period of the year either alone or feeling lonely - an important fact largely overlooked by both consumers and the people who market to them, says Baba Shiv, Sanwa Bank, Limited, Professor of Marketing at the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Shiv’s research comes on the heels of  census figures showing that many more adult Americans – 45 percent – are now single.

“Because of social media, you’d think people would be saying they’re less lonely than before the technology existed,” Shiv said.

Shiv became interested in studying loneliness, or the sense of being socially isolated, when he heard a statistic that stunned him: 25% of people today say they are lonely, a percentage that’s higher than in years past.

“That’s so counterintuitive,” he says. “Because of social media, you’d think people would be saying they’re less lonely than before the technology existed.”

How loneliness affects buying decisions

As someone who studies consumer behavior, Shiv naturally turned to the question of how loneliness affects buying decisions. In a recent study, which he conducted with colleagues from the business schools of the University of Iowa and the University of British Columbia, the researchers looked at what sort of movie lonely people would choose to rent from Netflix.

They showed participants a picture of a DVD case along with a description of the movie and a rating, supposedly the average of past viewers’ reviews. One randomly selected group saw information for a movie with a Netflix rating of 2.5 stars (or slightly below the midpoint on the site’s 5-star scale).

The other group saw information about exactly the same movie, but were told that its rating was 3.5 stars, a tad higher than the midpoint. After evaluating how much they would like the film and how likely they were to rent it, all the participants completed a standard loneliness questionnaire.

Most people, not surprisingly, said they would like to see the higher-rated movie. But intriguingly, just the opposite was true for those who scored on the lonely end of the loneliness scale: lonely participants actually favored the 2.5-star film.

Why would that be? The Netflix study was inconclusive, Shiv says, because 2.5 stars can mean quite different things. It’s possible that a movie earned that average because it’s loved by a significant minority, in the way of a cult film; but it could simply be a mediocre movie, rated below average by just about everyone.

Lonely people prefer the minority choice

Shiv and his colleagues ran more experiments and found results that matched the first interpretation. “People who are not lonely prefer to go with the majority, whereas people who are lonely prefer to go with the minority,” he says.

For example, in one study, students had to choose a piece of artwork after being told either that 80% of past buyers liked this artist’s work or that 20% of buyers liked it. The lonely students (and only the lonely) went along with the 20%.

However, there was an important twist to this result: It held up only when participants were shopping for art to display in their own room. When they were told they’d be buying art for a public space, they went along with the majority preference, just like the non-lonely students. Lonely people, Shiv believes, are often comfortable being lonely when they’re alone, and choose products that fit their identity as part of a minority. “But, in a social setting, they become so anxious about other people that they go overboard in going with the consensus.”

That private-public tension, says Shiv, creates the possibility of a troubling mismatch between buying decisions and actual preferences. “If a lonely person makes a purchase in public, but the consumption happens in private, that can result in huge dissatisfaction,” he says.

Despite what the loneliness questionnaires show about people’s private feelings, few are willing to publicly admit to their loneliness. This may be one reason marketers seem to underestimate the prevalence of the lonely consumer. TV commercials, for example, typically show people enjoying a product while amongst family or friends. “That may not work for the lonely consumer,” Shiv says. Not only might lonely people have a harder time relating to these social images, but also they may actually find such scenes off-putting, in much the same way they stayed away from majority-endorsed DVDs or artwork in Shiv’s studies.

Market online to reach lonely consumers

So what’s a marketer to do? “If a quarter of the target market is lonely, it might make sense to promote more heavily online,” Shiv suggests. For one thing, lonely people might shy away from bustling stores and movie theaters, and feel more comfortable in the privacy of their own homes, whether it be watching videos on Hulu.com or shopping on Amazon.

Reaching lonely consumers through online channels offers another advantage, Shiv says: the ability to show targeted offerings. Through traditional media, it’s not nearly as easy to target the lonely consumer as it is to reach a narrower but more visible swath of the population, such as Hispanics or Denver-area parents.

Online marketers, on the other hand, can customize their message based on browsing patterns and purchase histories. Personalized messages, such as “People like you bought this product” — something the Amazons and Netflixes are already doing across the board, will work especially well for lonely consumers, Shiv believes.

Consumers, for their part, can take comfort in knowing that though they may be lonely, they are far from alone. “It’s okay to be lonely,” Shiv says, “and it’s not something to be ashamed about.”

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