Coremetrics has released some initial data for Black Friday sales and the outcome for online retailers is looking great. Overall there was a 15.9% increase in sales between Black Friday 2009 and Black Friday 2010, and the average price per order is also up by 12.1% (from around $170 per order to $190.80).
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I think that we can all agree that referrals are probably the best lead generation tools out there. This post is not about the power of referrals though...for more on that check out The Referral Engine by John Janstch. This post is about online reviews, the digital referral, from complete strangers or sometimes acquaintances. These days the more online 'referrals' you have, the more likely the reader will pay attention to your business. Not all online or real life referrals are good, there are bad as well. As we have seen, the online community is not afraid to to talk about bad experiences. So what do you do when you get a bad review online?
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Happy Thanksgiving! I would be remiss if I didn't say how thankful I am every day to work in such a great industry with amazing co-workers, clients and vendors. I am certainly appreciative that you are reading this post today as well!
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Rupert Murdoch, CEO of News Corp, is planning on partnering with Apple to deliver a tablet-only subscription-based newspaper later this year called "The Daily." Rumor has it that the magazine will cost 99 cents per issue, and will be the first of many publications to embrace Apple's new subscription platform in iOS. With the pains that traditional print publications are currently struggling through there is no doubt that more media outlets will move towards offering digital versions of their paper publications (in some cases they may offer only digital content, as with The Daily), and this means that businesses will have the opportunity to deliver more dynamic and interactive advertisements to their potential customers.
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By now most of you have already planned out your Black Friday shopping. You will likely stay up the night before and hit the stores at midnight or wake up extremely early to make sure the items you are looking for aren't sold out. One benefit nowadays that wasn't available in the past: if you can't get what you were looking for on Black Friday or can't make it to the store, there's always Cyber Monday!
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An exec from AKQA that helped Volkswagen with the launch of their new GTI spoke at the Mobile Marketing Forum recently where he shared some very solid results. The center of their mobile strategy was an iPhone game that allowed the user to pick one of six custom designed cars by VW, including the new GTI.
Read moreHave you ever found yourself confused or overwhelmed by how the internet works, what a web application is and why it's important to use a modern web browser? Google has created a neat online book to help clarify the details for you, and best of all it's written in plain language with the newcomer or novice in mind. They've even included some cool illustrations and animations to guide you along the way!
Read moreThe big announcement of today wasn't very surprising and it appears that Myspace is doing everything they can to be obsolete. Users will now be able to login and carry their Facebook likes over to Myspace; based on their Facebook likes, the will get media recommendations. Because Myspace is primarily entertainment based, or as it is often called MTV 2.0, it is not a bad relationship, but is it too little too late? Myspace themselves have already stated that they should no longer be considered a social network but more of an 'entertainment hub'.
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The rumored official analytics product for and by twitter has apparently launched today with a select group of Twitter users getting invited to join. While there are already 3rd party apps that will give you some analytics for twitter, none of them will be able to provide the level of accuracy that an official tool by twitter can.
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The explosion of mobile device usage in the past few years has made it important that all small businesses claim their Google Places listings, and today's announcement of Google Hotpot is yet another reason for you to explore location-based services if you haven't already.
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If you are executing digital marketing, congratulations! You are most likely already one step ahead of your competition, and making strides to meaningfully connect with prospects online. But, how do you know if you’re seeing continual success year over year, and improving your metrics?
Without the tools in place to analyze and benchmark your efforts, it is impossible to scale your online marketing and ensure continuous success.
