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Net Notes
by Lundy Wilder
Net Notes is a column about using technology to help make your business or personal life run smoother. They are hints that I have used or know people that have used them. Like any recommendation…caveat emptor. See if it works for you! The hints provided here are all unpaid and unsolicited. If you have other hints email me and I’ll pass them on. lundy@mobilebaybusinessjournal.com
Phone Tag– A way to meld your email and voice mail.
Battery-Low?- Hints to get more from your iPhone battery.
Error 404 – Website dead-ends. A simple code to help your site’s visitors
Direct mail marketing hints - USPS publication to get your marketing juices going!
Templates– Microsoft offers a variety of forms that may improve your efficiency.
Drop.io– an upload center that works like an FTP
Gmail– a cure for the multiple email address mess
Goog411– forget cellphone 411 charges. Free info anywhere!
www.spotcrime.com- find out about your neighborhood or place you’re visiting.
MORE | Winning the Local Search Battle by Gregg Stewart
The local search marketplace continues to grow rapidly. Local is growing at a faster percentage rate than general search. Additionally, changes in search patterns show that consumers are becoming better and smarter searchers, moving from simple one- and two-keyword searches to more specific four- and five-keyword searches. The progression also shows important insights related to higher conversion rates for local search.
The good news: consumers signal a higher purchase interest based on the number of keywords contained in their search query. In many cases, these compound search queries include explicit geographic local search terms.
In short, the more specific a consumer is in the search query, the higher propensity to purchase. The consumer is shifting from "what to buy" category searches (e.g. plumbing, drain cleaning) to "where to buy" phrases (e.g. draining cleaning in Austin, Texas). MORE | Grocery coupons now on your cell phone
Staff Reports
The Kroger Co. has joined forces with Cellfire Inc., a mobile phone marketing company, to offer customers coupons through their wireless devices.
Cincinnati-based Kroger (NYSE: KR), the nation's largest standalone grocery store chain that has about 40 stores in the Louisville area, will offer the service in Georgia, South Carolina, eastern Tennessee and Alabama. Major consumer brands that will offer coupons include Clorox, ConAgra, Del Monte, General Mills, Kimberly-Clark and Unilever.
To use the service, customers must link their mobile number to their Kroger Plus savings card. Customers pick coupons from cellfire.com via their phone and load the coupons to their savings cards. The coupons are automatically applied at checkout with use of the savings card and are deleted from the queue after use. |
Hoiday Shoppers continue to shift to online
Competitive pricing important factor
New York, NY – November 19, 2008 – Nielsen Online, a service of the Nielsen Company announced that consumers will continue to shift their gift buying online this holiday season, citing convenience, time saving and price among the primary reasons for shopping on the Web. With the current economic downturn, there is an increased focus on price this year, with 53 percent of consumers citing price as a reason to buy online, compared with 46 percent last year. Interestingly, though, consumers continue to trump convenience more than price as the primary value of the channel, with 76 percent of consumers citing the ability to shop 24 hours a day and 74 percent citing time saving for why they shop online
These results are from a Nielsen Online pre-holiday survey intended to gauge online consumers’ holiday shopping plans for 2008. The online survey was fielded from November 6-11 among approximately 1,300 online shoppers in the U.S. who did holiday shopping online last year and/or planned to do so this year. MORE
| 2008 2Q E-Commerce $34.6B The Census Bureau of the Department of Commerce that the estimate of U.S. retail e-commerce sales for the second quarter of 2008, adjusted for seasonal variation, but not for price changes, was $34.6 billion, an increase of 2.9 percent (±1.0%) from the first quarter of 2008. More | Seniors’ needs opens new opportunity for IT development
Older adults want to use technology so they can age safely in their home. The study identifed a willingness to try technology like home security services, sensors to detect falls and devices to regulate temperature, lights and appliances. More | Technology with a price you’ll love by Dave Perry
One of the beautiful aspects of technology is that it’s constantly changing and new products are being developed to fill a niche. Here’s a list of a few that we think may be helpful. As with all free downloads or shareware – “caveat emptor” or buyer beware.
SyncMyCal - software that synch Outlook and Gmail calendars. MORE
BackPack
Organize your business, share info, schedules, documents, and to-do lists across your company, group, or organization with this software. MORE TimeBridge
TimeBridge's one-step scheduling allows you select attendees, propose meeting times and send a meeting invitation. MORE Foxit Reader for Windows
Your Adobe Acrobat Reader got you down? Want to manipulate PDFs but can’t? Foxit allows you to read and fill out PDF files. MORE TrackMyShipments
TrackMyShipments automatically tracks your shipments with all the major shipping companies. MORE
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