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Category: Retail & eCommerce

eCommerce, Online Retail & Retail News

  • Amazon Goes From Game Retailer To Game Developer

    Amazon Goes From Game Retailer To Game Developer

    Amazon has been doing a lot lately to position themselves as one of the major players in the gaming market. The retailer seems to have a hand in everything these days from traditional sales to free-to-play digital games. They never had a hand in actual game development, but a retailer wouldn’t make games, right?

    My assumption was wrong as Amazon announced yesterday afternoon that they are indeed now in the business of making games. The retailer revealed the existence of Amazon Game Studios and their first game, Living Classics, on the newly minted Amazon Game Studios Web site.

    So why would Amazon, a retailer, get in the business of making games? The company says that they’re providing additional entertainment and value to their customer base that plays a lot of free-to-play social games. To ensure they have a hit with their first game, Amazon Game Studios plays it a little too safe with Living Classics. Here’s the description:

    Living Classics, our first major release, is what we call a “moving object game.” In the game, a family of foxes have wandered into vibrant, animated illustrations from their favorite books including Alice in Wonderland, The Wizard of Oz, and King Arthur. Players help to reunite the foxes by exploring beautifully illustrated scenes and spotting moving objects. You can visit friends, share rewards you’ve earned, rediscover famous stories, and reunite fox families.

    Regardless, Amazon entering the actual game creation business is pretty big news. While their first game is only available on Facebook, what’s to stop them from making free-to-play desktop games? They already have a portal for other publishers to distribute their games and content to players. Will Amazon use their power to push their games over those of others? It’s too early to tell, but they are questions that we must keep in mind going forward.

    If you want to see how Amazon’s first game turned out, check out Living Classics on Facebook. If you’re unwary, check out the trailer first to see if this “moving object” game is right for you.

  • Obama Punching Bag Now Available at Various Online Retailers

    Obama Punching Bag Now Available at Various Online Retailers

    Do a quick Google image search for President Barack Obama and you’re likely to encounter a number of questionable items, including Obama as Bob Marley, Obama as Yoda, and Obama as Baraka from Mortal Kombat. Some of them are amusing, while others are downright offense. Although you can dress Obama up as Sarah Palin without stirring much controversy in the process, apparently you can’t put the President’s likeness on a punching bag. According to a handful of patrons at an Indiana fair, that’s going one step too far.

    Delaware County GOP spokesman Tom Bennington, who expressed that the punching bag was “mildly offensive”, added, “I’m retired military and I respect the commander in chief. From that perspective it was offensive and we asked to take it down and it was taken down.”

    The offending punching bag features a cartoon version of the President wearing shorts and boxing gloves, as well as sporting a black eye. Bennington said the inflatable toy was supposed to illustrate Republicans “beating” Obama in the upcoming election, though, at the end of the day, fair officials seemed to understand that the object was more than a little disrespectful.

    However, just because folks at an Indiana fair think it’s in poor taste to display such an item, that doesn’t mean you can’t go online an purchase one of your very own. A quick search online reveals the Obama punching bag is available from a number of different retailers, including Amazon, eBay, and Prank Place. If you currently have twenty bucks (plus shipping) burning a hole in the pocket of your skinny jeans, then, by all means, knock yourselves out. Just don’t be surprised if someone is offended by your brand new lawn decoration.

  • Ad Nauseam: Are Facebook Ads Really Worth It?

    In theory, advertising on Facebook allows marketers to reach one of the largest populations of potential buyers possible. Short of throwing up a banner ad on the moon, it’s unlikely that you’re going to find an outlet with more upside – the network is approaching 1 billion users.

    In theory.

    But of course, unlike a Super Bowl ad or the like, not everyone in the target population is going to see any given Facebook advertisement. Whether it be a Sponsored Story in a user’s news feed or a more traditional ad on the side of the page, they are all competing with each other for attention at all times.

    Is Facebook the best place to advertise? The worst? Somewhere in between? What do you think are the advantages and disadvantages to a paid Facebook campaign? Let us know in the comments.

    Are people seeing the ads? Are they getting lost amidst the busy Facebook homepage? Do users even notice them anymore? Are Sponsored Stories more effective that traditional ads? All of these questions are simply part of a larger question that marketers have been asking themselves recently.

    Is advertising on Facebook worth it?

    General Motors makes a move

    Although it’s an advertiser’s job to ask the “is it worth it?” question regarding any medium that they consider throwing cash into, the spotlight seemed to turn directly on Facebook after a very public breakup between the social network and a giant American automaker.

    Back in May (right before the IPO), General Motors yanked all of their paid advertising from Facebook. According to the reports, GM was unconvinced of the effectiveness of advertising on the site. GM’s Marketing Chief Joel Ewanick said that the company was “definitely reassessing our advertising on Facebook, although the content is effective and important.”

    Short and sweet version: Facebook ads don’t really work, but we gotta maintain a brand page.

    This decision resonated among the social media/advertising community (and in the halls at Menlo Park, I assume). A few days later, the blow of this giant pullout was lessened a bit when we learned that GM was also planning on ditching its Super Bowl ad campaign in 2013. Maybe the Facebook exodus wasn’t personal after all – maybe it was simply part of a bigger strategy. We have to concede, however, that the timing of it all, days before the IPO, reeks just a bit.

    Earlier this month, we heard that GM may be returning to the Facebook ad game, as executives at both companies have had talks. Even so, GM dropping its Facebook ad strategy just days before the IPO solidified the uneasiness and trepidation surrounding the culture of Facebook advertising.

    Advertiser confidence on shaky ground

    The folks over at GM aren’t the only advertisers that have doubted the efficacy of Facebook ads. Some recent reports from brand marketers and agency executives have painted a less-than-rosy picture concerning confidence that Facebook is a worthwhile platform to spend a good chunk of ad dollars.

    33across’ Advertiser and Agency Study looked at over 2000 of these professionals and came up with a pretty interesting stat: 71% said that they were focusing 80% of their attention on other advertising mediums not named Facebook. Just four months ago, only 58% of ad men were mostly staying away from Facebook.

    Not only that, but only 7% said that they were putting the majority of their ad dollars into Facebook. A whopping 0% said that 80% of their efforts come in the form of Facebook ads. Back in March, that number was small, but present at 4%.

    In all, post-IPO, more than five times the number of respondents said that they were planning on decreasing their Facebook ad spending.

    Another study of marketer/agency exec attitudes came to this conclusion: Facebook is vital, but Facebook ads may not be.

    You see, although 86% said that Facebook is currently a part of their paid advertising strategy, 88% said that they would consider forgoing all of the paid stuff and just sticking with “implementing Facebook content.” If you’ve heard that before, just look a few lines up a what GM said. Basically, they’re both saying that having a presence on Facebook is important, but they can own, operate, and promote content through their brand pages for free.

    The same group of people was asked their opinion of how useful Facebook is a “driving purchase intent.” Only 12.2% said that it is “very useful.” 19% said they didn’t know. 13.4% said it’s not useful at all and 55.5% said that it’s “somewhat” useful. What’s our takeaway here?

    One word. “Meh.”

    Facebook’s post-IPO ad blitz

    Right before the IPO, marketing software provider WordStream released a report card comparing Facebook and Google in the ad game. Long story short, Google won. In their mind, Facebook failed at their ad targeting options and ad formats.

    “So far, Facebook’s advertising platform hasn’t kept pace with the explosive growth of its social network, and it remains to be seen if CEO Mark Zuckerberg even wants to focus on advertising as a source of revenue,” said WordStream’s Larry Kim. “In his 2,500+ word letter to shareholders…he mentioned advertising just once.”

    Of course, Zuck and the team has to focus on advertising. Since going public, monetization is probably the only thing that’s been on his mind.

    That’s because it’s the main concern of anyone looking to the future of the company. And monetization in general isn’t the real concern – it’s actually mobile monetization that has been a hot topic surrounding Facebook both before and after the IPO.

    “We do not currently directly generate any meaningful revenue from the use of Facebook mobile products, and our ability to do so successfully is unproven… and if we are unable to successfully implement monetization strategies for our mobile users, or if we incur excessive expenses in this effort, our financial performance and ability to grow revenue would be negatively affected”

    Those words came straight from Facebook in their IPO filings. Zuckerberg himself has since echoed those claims. And in an effort to “generate meaningful revenue,” Facebook is in the process of making quite a few changes to their advertising options – which is good news for advertisers.

    In one of the most important tweaks to their ad platform, Facebook now allows advertisers to purchase mobile-only Sponsored Stories. Before, you couldn’t choose exactly where the Sponsored Story you paid for would show up. But now, mobile-only targeting is one of five different ad options that Facebook offers.

    We also know that a new ad platform, Facebook Exchange, is on the way. It’s basically a real-time ad bidding service that allows advertisers to target Facebook users based on previous activities. Here’s how I explained it before:

    The premise of Facebook Exchange is pretty simple: When you visit a site (other than Facebook) and spend some time looking at a product, but don’t make the final purchase – that third-party site will be able to follow you to Facebook and target you there with a highly specialized ad.

    For example, let’s say that I spent a good while checking out a new watch on a third-party retailer’s site (that has enlisted a demand-side platform) – let’s go with Swatch. Although I didn’t actually end up buying the watch, I was on the site long enough for them to determine that I was very interested in it – so they hit me with a cookie.

    If the advertiser (in this case Swatch) wanted to pursue me beyond the walls of its site, the demand-side platform would contact Facebook and use an anonymous User ID to show intent to target me. Now, the next time I log in the Facebook, that cookie alerts everyone to my presence and the advertiser is allowed to make a real-time bid to show a pre-rendered ad to me.

    And if everything goes according to plan, I’ll see a perfectly targeted ad for that blue Swatch watch I was eyeing earlier that day – or even earlier that week.

    We’ve also heard reports that Facebook will soon be targeting mobile ads based on app usage. This means that if you play a lot of Zynga’s game Word with Friends, you may see an ad for another Zynga game like Scramble with Friends. As a user, you wouldn’t even have to have “liked” Zynga to see this ad. That’s because Facebook knows you’re playing Words with Friends because it forces you to log in through Facebook connect.

    And it’s not only mobile ads that have been seeing some changes (or proposed changes). Recently, Facebook has been experimenting with showing more traditional right-side ads on pages as well as switching out the ads when users linger on a page.

    Of course, all the ads, ads, ads could be having a negative effect on user engagement. In the latest American Customer Satisfaction Index, Facebook did just drop nearly 8% since 2011.

    Some good signs for Facebook ads

    If advertisers are going to retain/regain faith in Facebook ads, they probably need to see results. A recent report from TBG Digital suggests that Facebook ads are engaging – much more so than a competing service like Twitter.

    TBG’s report looked at click-through rates of Facebook ads – both mobile and desktop – and compared them to Twitter ads in the user feed. They found that Facebook ads on desktop has a CTR of .588%, and mobile ads nearly doubled that at a rate of 1.14%. By comparison, Twitter ads had a CTR of .266%. That means, on average Facebook ads (mobile and desktop) are around three times as effective as Twitter ads.

    Facebook’s higher CTR was attributed to the effectiveness of Sponsored Stories in the news feed, which feel more organic and less like a traditional ads. TBG also found that right-side traditional ads are becoming more and more ignored.

    Data from a few Facebook Ads API partners echoes the good news about Facebook ads – when it comes to mobile. One parter found that Facebook mobile ads had a CTR that quadrupled the combined CTR of all other types of ad placements. Another source went even higher, reporting a 25x efficacy for mobile ads over other traditional ads.

    A small legal problem going forward

    Now that we’ve seen just how effective mobile ads in the form of Sponsored Stories can be, it’s time to tell you that Facebook is soon going to have to let you opt out of being featured as a Sponsored Story.

    This comes as a result of a lawsuit filed by five plaintiffs in California. They claimed that Facebook had violated the law by using their likeness in advertisements (Sponsored Stories) without their consent, compensation, or the ability to opt out.

    Facebook settled the suit with a $10 million cy-pres payment, which will go to charity. But they also agreed to amend their Statement of Rights and Responsibilities and implement an opt-out mechanism for Sponsored Stories. The opt-out mechanism will allow for user to exempt any past activities from begin featured as Sponsored Stories, although it won’t prevent them from seeing Sponsored Stories in their own news feeds.

    From the settlement:

    Facebook will create an easily accessible mechanism that enables users to view the subset of their interactions and other content that have been displayed in Sponsored Stories. Facebook will further engineer settings to enable users, upon viewing the interactions and other content that have been used in Sponsored Stories, to control which of these interactions and other content are edible to appear in additional Sponsored Stories.

    This may not be a killer, but it definitely impacts Facebook’s ability to get advertisers enthusiastic about ads, as well as advertisers confidence in the ads’ efficacy.

    Facebook is making plenty of moves to boost ad revenues by making it more attractive to brands. Do you think that Facebook advertising is worth it? If you’ve participated in an ad campaign on the site, what were the results? If you’re a Facebook user, what kind of marketing are you most likely to interact with? Let us know in the comments.

  • Best Buy Stores Makeover: Retailer Starts to Think Smaller

    Best Buy Stores Makeover: Retailer Starts to Think Smaller

    Best Buy stores makeover: Expect the size of the retail giant’s stores to shrink considerably in the near future. In an effort to combat the shrinking revenue from their numerous oversized locations, Best Buy is building a new prototype store near its Minnesota headquarters that will pull a page straight out of the Apple playbook. Instead of carrying every possible electronic gadget under the proverbial sun, the company will think smaller, carrying a more concentrated selection of devices in an effort to turn the tide of their floundering business.

    In addition to scaling down the number of items in their showroom, Best Buy will also feature something called Solution Central, which is essentially their version of Apple’s Genius Bar. Staffed by Geek Squad employees, customers can, in theory, bring their electronic problems to the location and have them apply their endless knowledge to the issues at-hand. However, despite their plan to implement a solution center for consumers, the company is rumored to be laying off over 650 Geek Squad employees across the nation.

    Since the company is saying goodbye to some of its technicians, does that mean Best Buy is getting out of of the at-home support business? According to company, “Best Buy 2.0” will still offer these service to its customers, though it, too, will become more streamlined. “We know that clients will always need us to come to their homes, and increasingly their needs are more complex. That’s why we’re evolving in-home support for a more specific customer segment,” the company said in a statement.

    According to the Wall Street Journal, all of these significant changes are a concentrated effort to save the company nearly $800 million over the next three years. And if they manage to regain some marketshare, that would be a positive, as well. In addition to possibly rolling out smaller versions of their stores, Best Buy will close nearly 50 underperforming locations.

    Smaller stores, less Geek Squad employees, limited in-home support — the Best Buy as its currently known may become a thing of the past. As brick-and-mortar retailers continue to struggle against their online counterparts, implementing such changes are the only way these companies can compete. Although I’ll miss the days of mindlessly browsing the store’s seemingly endless selection of movies, DVDs, and computer games, that time has admittedly come and gone. Best Buy is dead; long live Best Buy 2.0.

  • Nintendo Begins Offering Retailer-Specific Pre-Order Exclusives

    Nintendo Begins Offering Retailer-Specific Pre-Order Exclusives

    Last month it was revealed that New Super Mario Bros 2 will be getting downloadable content (DLC) in the months following its release. Gamers will be able to purchase and download new Coin Rush stages for the game.

    This week, Nintendo announced that customers in the U.K. who pre-order New Super Mario Bros 2 through GAME or Gamestation stores will receive a collectible case necklace styled to look like a gold coin from the game. U.S. customers can order the game online (and only online) from GameStop to have a Gold Mario Pin shipped with the game. Note that neither of these bonus items contains any real gold – they are only gold-colored.

    Exclusive pre-order bonuses based on what retailer gamers pre-order through has been a growing trend over the past few years. For example, gamers who pre-ordered The Amazing Spider-Man with Amazon received a playable Stan Lee, while those who pre-ordered at GameStop received a Rhino mini-game. Capcom is providing exclusive Mercenary Mode map unlock codes to each of its retail partners for Resident Evil 6 pre-orders, and gamers who pre-ordered Hitman: Absolution from GameStop can even play pre-release game content. Of course, these exclusive DLC offers are as good as telling gamers that there is more content for their game that they cannot access, unless they pre-order several versions of the game.

    To Nintendo’s credit, it’s pre-order exclusive is not exclusive game content already on the game disc that gamers have purchased. When the company begins giving away different colored Yoshi’s for each retailer, then we will all know that gaming as we once knew it is gone.

  • EA Looking At Other Games For Premium Subscriptions

    EA Looking At Other Games For Premium Subscriptions

    We were hoping this wouldn’t happen when EA announced that they were launching a premium service for Battlefield 3. Then the announcement came out that EA/DICE has sold 800,000 subscribers the Battlefield 3 Premium service. Now it look as though EA is looking into other franchises that it currently has to see if the “premium” or subscription based service will be worth the effort.

    In an interview with Games Industry International, EA Labels boss Frank Gibeau said:

    “We’ve launched subscription businesses in our other categories. We had EA Sports subscription before Elite came out, so adding that component to the design is not a reaction. It’s something we’d always been considering and we had been looking at. We didn’t have it ready for launch and it took us some time to get it prepped. Having said that, they [Activision] did something really innovative and if your competitor does something innovative and you think it applies to what you can do, then there’s no harm in doing that,” he said. “This is an industry where people have a lot of oneupsmanship and if somebody innovates, you match it or you exceed it.”

    With the success that EA has achieved with first its sports subscription and now Battlefield 3 Premium, we can all look forward to the day when we get the Need For Speed Premium emails from Origin. Then what is next is obvious. I think that eventually you will only be able to purchase DLC in gigantic $50-$60 “premium” packs. so that the developers can “justify’ the fact that they “only” charge you $60 to “buy” a game. Lots of quotations expresses the severe sarcasm in my remarks.

  • Journey Travels To Retail With Some Friends

    Journey Travels To Retail With Some Friends

    Journey is one of the most compelling and wonderful experiences you can have on the PlayStation 3. It was the culmination of all the ideas thatgamecompany has tinkered with on prior projects like flOw and Flower. It set all kinds of records when it hit the PSN back in March, but now it’s time to make one last journey to the land of retail.

    Sony and thatgamecompany announced that Journey Collector’s Edition will be hitting retail on August 28 for the low price of $29.99. The collection will package the excellent Journey with the developers previous games – flOw and Flower – alongside a plethora of extras.

    Check out the absolutely beautiful boxart below. I know it says “Art not final,” but I can’t imagine a better looking boxart for such a great collection.

    Journey Travels To Retail With Some Friends

    The extras included with the these three stellar games make the asking price of $29.99 seem a little too low. I would gladly pay $50 for the games alongside these extras:

  • 30-minute behind-the-scenes documentary about the making of Journey
  • Creator Commentary play-throughs of all three games
  • Three exclusive mini-games from thatgamecompany
  • Concept art and screenshot galleries for all three games
  • Original soundtracks for all three games
  • PS3 dynamic themes and wallpapers
  • PSN avatars including 8 exclusive new Journey avatars never released before
  • Official game trailers and developer diary videos
  • Reversible cover art

    • Of course, I’m a sucker for soundtracks and developer commentaries. Sony knows their audience and they know it well. The folks at thatgamecompany have cultivated one of the most diehard group of fans the industry has ever known. I would say that they are the Western-equivalent of Team ICO, the team behind Sony’s other artistic greats – ICO and Shadow of the Colossus.

    The post also contains details on the three mini-games that are included in the collection. The folks at thatgamecompany took part in a 24 hour game jam where they had a day to create a working prototype of a game. The three mini-games included are the games that they made. They make a point to note that the three games – Gravediggers, Duke War!!, and Nostril Shot – will be making their first playable debut in this collection.

    If you have not played Journey, Flower or flOw, I implore you to pick up this set. If you have played them, you should probably pick up this set anyway. Sony and thatgamecompany did some really special things with these three games that helped the cause of talking about games as art. They will always hold a special place in my heart, and I really hope this new retail release will open the wonder and beauty of these games to an entirely new audience.

  • Apple Retail Employees Get Raises, Product Discounts

    Apple Retail Employees Get Raises, Product Discounts

    It looks like the summer of 2012 is a good time to work for Apple. According to reports today Apple Store employees are being given better discounts on Apple products, and some are receiving raises as high as 25-30%. The discount program is the fulfillment of a promise made back in January by Tim Cook, while the raises appear to be at least partly in response to anonymous complaints that employees were underpaid.

    According to 9to5Mac, as of today Apple Store employees can get $500 off Macs (except the retina display MacBook Pro) and $250 off iPads when purchasing through their employee web portal. Employees already got 25% off of every Apple product. These discounts are in addition to that. Which means that if you work in an Apple Store, as of today you could get the most expensive iPad – 64GB with cellular, normally $829 – for $371.75. That, for those of you playing the home game, is almost $130 cheaper than the cheapest iPad, the 16GB WiFi only, which normally costs $499. Of course, there’s a catch: employees can only use the discounts once every three years.

    Now, earlier in the week we brought you news that Apple Store employees would be getting across-the-board raises of about $4 per hour. Later information revealed cast some doubt on that, however. But now it appears that a significant raise really is in the cards for at least some Apple Store employees. According to the Dow Jones Newswire, some Apple Store employees were notified of the raises in meetings as early as last week.

    According to the report, the raises – which are merit based – could amount to as much as 25% of an employee’s current salary. It seems that Apple chose to make the move following an internal review, during which one of the employees’ chief complaints was that they were not adequately compensated. It seems that Geniuses and Creatives – tech support and educational employees, respectively – showed the highest levels of frustration with their pay.

    Employees who are receiving raises should expect to begin seeing them reflected in their paycheck beginning in late July.

    So, to recap: Apple is giving retail employees significant new discounts on Apple products, while also giving many of them extra money with which to pay for those new products (or, you know, to pay the electric bill; whatever floats your boat). All in all, not a bad time to be an Apple employee.

  • YouTube Subscriptions May be the Future

    YouTube Subscriptions May be the Future

    Reuters is reporting that YouTube may consider selling subscriptions to viewers sometime in the near future. Speaking at the Reuters Media and Technology Summit, Salar Kamangar, CEO of YouTube and senior vice president of video at Google, said that smaller cable channels might have a place on YouTube, and could sell subscriptions through an a la carte option. He also stated that some of YouTube’s “top content creators” want to be able to sell subscriptions as well. Kamangar said the company is talking about subscription options “very carefully.”

    The cable channels Kamangar mentioned are channels that have a small audience, and so don’t command many, if any, fees from cable distributors. These channels would lose little by offering their content directly through a YouTube subscription. Obviously, this is a shot across the bow of the cable industry, which is fighting as hard as it can to not simply become another utility industry, pumping out internet connections to homes the way electricity companies or water companies provide their products. Just this week, the U.S. Department of Justice began investigating cable companies for possible anti-competitive practices with regards to Netflix and Hulu.

    As for content creators on YouTube, it’s likely that few of them would be able to charge subscription fees on their own. Groups of them could team up, though, creating their own channels. Recently, more for-profit YouTube channel ventures have been popping up, such as Felecia Day’s Geek and Sundry.

    I suspect Kamangar said YouTube was discussing the prospect “very carefully” because it knows the uproar that would be caused if YouTube users were suddenly asked to pay for content that used to be free. Still, if YouTube can gather up enough quality content to make it work, it would be another step closer to breaking the cable company monopolies in the U.S. And when that finally happens, premium-quality channels such as HBO can finally be free to sell their content directly to willing customers, even without YouTube.

    (via Reuters)

  • Square Inc. Doubles its Reach to Over 20,000 Retailers

    Square Inc. Doubles its Reach to Over 20,000 Retailers

    Back in April, Twitter’s Jack Dorsey announced that his newest venture, Square Inc was already processing about $5 billion worth of transactions per year, and being used at almost 10,000 stores around the country.

    Today, that number has doubled and Square is an accepted form of payment at over 20,000 outlets nationwide.

    For about ten bucks you can go to Walmart, Target, or Best Buy and get a Square reader for your iPhone, iPad, or Android device. There’s even an app that will let you pay at some shops just by telling the cashier your name. Pretty impressive! I guess that’s why they have over one million registered customers.

    But Square still has some pretty stiff competition to overcome by their biggest rival, PayPal. While payments on Square cost 2.75%, PayPal charges only 2.7% and it doesn’t require merchants to purchase any additional equipment. Payments are processed using either a PayPal card or a phone number and PIN ID.

    Also, PayPal’s latest initiative has them partnered with 15 extremely popular retailers including Abercrombie & Fitch, Advance Auto Parts, Aéropostale, American Eagle Outfitters, Barnes & Noble, Foot Locker, Guitar Center, Jamba Juice, JC Penney, Jos. A. Bank Clothiers, Nine West, Office Depot, Rooms To Go, Tiger Direct and Toys “R” Us.

    So there’s some fierce competition to overcome before we can really consider Square Inc. to be a leader in the mobile payments arena, but last we heard, Jack Dorsey was out drumming up interest from prominent investors like Legg Mason and Fidelity, so another big breakthrough could be just on the horizon. We’ll keep you posted.

  • Facebook Outage Killed Some Retail Sites’ Performance

    Facebook Outage Killed Some Retail Sites’ Performance

    On Thursday night, Facebook experienced a major worldwide outage that lasted, in some cases, for a couple of hours. Things have been less-than-perfect for users since then, even after Facebook released a statement saying that everything should be a-ok. Users were still reporting this morning that Facebook was either slow to load or down altogether, although things seem to have cleared up for most users as of the writing of this article.

    Not only was the outage a problem for Facebook and its users, but apparently it also hurt some major e-commerce sites that sat “spinning” while waiting for resources from Facebook to load. It appears that sites that were affected were ones that connect to Facebook’s open graph, display the “like” or “share” button, etc. According to web monitoring company Catchpoint, sites with Facebook plugins experienced “massive performance and usability issues” during the outage.

    Some of the sites affected belonged to retailers like JCPenney, Urban Outfitter, L.L. Bean, Teleflora, and 1-800-Flowers.

    From Catchpoint:

    The issue affected mostly web sites that have placed the Facebook code inline in their page. From an end-user perspective the “spinning hourglass” never stopped while loading the web page because the browser waited and waited and waited for resources to www.facebook.com to complete which they never did. Worst case scenario users might have seen pages hanging or functionality of the page was impaired.

    By contrast, sites that loaded content before making third-party requests didn’t show any problems on the user end.

    Here’s a graph that they provide showing how one of the aforementioned retailers was affected:

    For webmasters, this kind of thing is a reminder that outages of sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Google can affect their sites in a pretty serious way. Of course, Catchpoint makes a point to say that it’s more of a “wake up call” for site owners to be prepared and build their sites in a way that expects this sort of thing.

    As far as the outage goes, many speculated that Anonymous may have been behind the attack. They responded via Twitter with an emphatic no:

    Anonymous
    @YourAnonNews     Note: Anonymous would never attack Facebook, we have said this many times. Why would we attack a tool that many anons use to spread info?
    1 hour ago via TweetDeck · powered by @socialditto
     Reply  · Retweet  · Favorite

    [h/t Business Insider]

  • Morgan Stanley Praised for Facebook IPO by COO

    Morgan Stanley Chairman and Chief Executive, James Gorman is defending the work they did on the Facebook IPO, claiming they played it 100% by the book and that also, he isn’t aware of any dissent regarding Facebook share prices or anything else, as far as the underwriters are concerned.

    In fact, last Friday, Facebook’s chief operating officer, Sheryl Sandberg called Gorman to thank him for his efforts on the IPO and offer his firm a professional reference.

    Gorman further explained that the mass confusion which took place the morning of the IPO was indeed due to a technological problem originating from Nasdaq’s market systems and not anything to do with operations at Morgan Stanley. He also cites the financial crisis in Greece as a potential cause for Facebook’s poorly performing stocks.

    Furthermore he urged investors and the general public to view the share prices from a twelve-month perspective rather than just seeing the short term. Gorman explains his perspective, “Facebook is a great company and will still be in so in a few months”.

    While Morgan Stanley has made efforts to review trades from the IPO launch date and give their clients the best possible prices despite the computer glitch from Nasdaq. Though some investors in New York and California have already filed lawsuits regarding a revised financial reports which failed to surface just days before the IPO launch.

    Facebook shares are currently being traded on the Nasdaq for around $28 and have been on a steady downward path since the IPO launch on the 18th of May. Meanwhile, Facebook continues to expand their operations into other nations and address their shortcoming in mobile advertising in an effort to increase their bottom line.

  • In-App Subscriptions Now Available On Google Play

    In-App Subscriptions Now Available On Google Play

    Android has a problem – it can’t monetize itself very well. Some people blame it on the fact that the Android market is severely fragmented while others blame it on Google limiting the amount of options that developers can use to monetize their apps. Google is at least going to fix the latter starting today.

    An announcement went out today signaling the beginning of in-app subscriptions for Android apps on Google Play. Previously, the only way to monetize an Android app through Google Play was to either charge up front for it or use in-app billing which allowed people to buy items in game through Google Wallet.

    The next logical step is of course in-app subscriptions and Google is happy to comply. This means that developers can now set up subscription fees from inside their apps. Developers can now charge for monthly to annual fees through their apps for the services it provides. This kind of monetization is especially helpful for apps like mobile newspapers.

    Google uses the example of gaming on Android. For a game that required a monthly fee in the past, the player would have to enter their credentials and pay for the game each month. Now with in-app subscriptions through Google Play, they can set up a monthly subscription and have Google Play take care of the rest.

    The new feature is user friendly as well. All user have to do is visit My Apps in the Google Play store app to see any recurring subscriptions. They can cancel at any time. The only non-user friendly bit is that it auto-renews subscriptions so it’s up to the user to remember whenever a renewal is on the horizon.

    The launch of this new service is also super helpful to developers. They can use a new HTTP-based publisher API to connect their Android apps with their Web apps. Users can subscribe via Google Play and the Web app will recognize that subscription. For example, MMOs would be able to feature a mobile component that carries over to the Web experience and vice versa.

    Google Play subscriptions are now available to all developers. You can get started by checking out the documentation and sample app. Subscriptions will be available to all users running Google Play 3.5 and above.

  • Samsung, Sony Barring Retailers from Discounting TVs

    Samsung, Sony Barring Retailers from Discounting TVs

    Samsung and Sony have both commenced barring retailers from discounting television sets to protect profits, in an attempt to cut down on ‘showrooming.’ Showrooming is the practice of consumers going into a big box retailer and then likewise buying the tested product online for cheaper.

    The practice of showrooming has affected the business of Best Buy, which has shut down some stores recently, and is also rumored to be the reason why Target stopped carrying Amazon’s Kindle tablet. The retailer likely became weary of shoppers being able to use the device to instantaneously order most products sold in its stores by logging on to Amazon for some one-click purchases.

    Apple has historically maintained strict pricing policies, and Sony has had a hand in controlling the lowest retail prices merchants can allow. Still, LG and Panasonic allow discounting, which can add a competitor threat to the existing problem with showrooming. Consumers should’ve expect to see any discounted Sony or Samsung TVs in the bear future, though one shouldn’t hold their breath on any sort of deal regarding Panasonic’s upcoming 145″ 8K Plasma TV.

  • Morgan Stanley to Adjust Facebook Prices for Retail Customers

    Morgan Stanley to Adjust Facebook Prices for Retail Customers

    Good news for early Facebook IPO investors who may have been a victim of Nasdaq’s computer communication glitch, Morgan Stanley is reviewing all of the trades that went through on that day. As you remember, trading was delayed by a half hour Friday morning as big bank trading desks attempted to verify who bought what and at what price. The issue was quickly resolved, but the delay caused a temporary spike in trading that quickly settled back down to the $38 targeted per share price.

    The market closed at just over $38 on Friday. The weekend didn’t reflect any prominent trading either and by monday at 4PM, Facebook closed at $34. Tuesday saw more declines and closed at just over $31 and trades today haven’t strayed too much from that price range. In fact, it looks like $30 would have been an ideal price range for the offering.

    Anyway, the trading reviews from Morgan Stanley are welcome news for many investors who may have overpaid. Reuters obtained a copy of the official memo put out by the bank regarding their review of the trades on Friday.

    Here are a few key statements taken from Morgan Stanley’s memo:

    “All orders are currently being reviewed for best execution pricing,”

    “We expect there will be a number of price adjustments. The largest adjustments will be processed first over the next several days and the remaining adjustments will be completed as quickly and as thoroughly as possible.”

    The news of the review comes as several investors in New York, California, and most likely Massachusetts filed lawsuits over revenue projections that were allegedly kept secret during Facebook’s promotional IPO investors roadshow and subsequent IPO launch. The lawsuits in California in New York are over damages sustained from being misinformed about the health of the investments.

    Massachusetts has yet to actually file a suit, but officials have subpoenaed documents relating to the revenue forecasts. Meanwhile investors and experts in the financial sector are calling the sequence of events an outrage. It has all the workings of a really great scandal.

    Oh, I almost forgot, Wall Street regulators are now investigating the allegations that some of the big bank investors were tipped off about the revised earnings projections, while others were left in the dark. Some banks have even come forward to say they believe Facebook fudged some of their own numbers to make investments seem more favorable. It just keeps getting worse. Check back regularly and we’ll keep you informed as this thing evolves.

  • How Beauty Chain Sephora Is Taking Retail Digital

    How Beauty Chain Sephora Is Taking Retail Digital

    Cosmetics retailer Sephora is known for the very hands-on, but pressure-free experience it offers to consumers in its physical stores. The company, however, is also making a name for itself in the online world as it ramps up its digital efforts.

    Julie Bornstein, Senior Vice President of Sephora Direct Sephora recently rolled out a “digital makeover,” which included a new website, a deep integration with Pinterest, and an iOS program that brings devices into every store. According to Julie Bornstein, the Senior Vice President of Sephora Direct, all these changes emphasize the company’s focus on meeting consumer needs in the digital age.

    “When we look at our consumers, we truly believe that digital is the reality – it’s the way the world is going,” she said. “We want to make sure that we’re out there testing things early, so we’re ready for the next changes that come.”

    As Bornstein explained, Sephora has been a strong advocate of innovation all along. When it came to the U.S. in 1998, the company essentially reinvented how cosmetics are purchased.

    “I think it’s [innovation is] part of our DNA,” said Bornstein.

    “We really believe in leveraging whatever trends, whether they’re digital or product related or color related,” she continued, “and being out there one step ahead of consumers so that they can find what they are looking for.”

    Sephora’s passion for consumers is evident in its most recent changes. For instance, the company’s new website is clearly focused on making the site easy for consumers to use. Bornstein tells us that Sephora went through all its nearly 14,000 products and tagged them in order to make product searches more accurate. The company also added content to the site to include lists of their favorite products as well as industry favorites.

    Sephora Redesigned Website

    “We really added a lot of intelligence to the way you search and shop for beauty,” she said.

    In terms of the Pinterest integration with Sephora, it allows users to pin products and brand pages easily. Sephora has also added its own boards, which highlight specific looks and products.

    “The reason we were drawn to Pinterest is because, unlike other social media forums, this one is so great in the world of fashion,” pointed out Bornstein.

    “It really is about inspiration and aspiration, and that works very well with our product set.”

    Sephora - Pinterest Integration

    In another effort to bridge its offline and online shopping experiences, Sephora introduced an in-store iOS initiative. The company has brought in iPod Touch devices to speed up the checkout process for consumers. Furthermore, Sephora is testing the use of iPads in multiple stores to allow consumers to interact with its menu of services, which includes the option of emailing instructions for certain makeup techniques.

    “It’s a mix of, I would say, bringing great information to the consumer and also just making the shopping experience a little more seamless,” said Bornstein.

    She went on to say that Sephora encourages consumers to use their mobile devices to check reviews and keep track of items they want. The company believes that, if consumers are more informed, they will have a better shopping experience.

    This week, in yet another effort to enhance its digital experience, the company also launched its “15 Days of Beauty Thrills” for its loyal clients. As of Monday, fans could sign up on Sephora’s website to win a prize with any online purchase.

    Although not every retailer is on board yet, it’s clear that digital is having a significant impact on the ecommerce industry. Facebook, for example, has drastically changed the way the Internet works and, therefore, what users expect on other sites.

    Sephora is looking at these changes as opportunities and is hoping to capitalize on them for the best interest of consumers and the overall retail industry.

    “I think there will be an evolution in the way ecommerce functions, and it will become more integrated into your social experience,” said Bornstein.

    “We’re excited about where beauty and digital meet, and how we can really change the beauty purchasing and exploration experience.”

  • YouTube Considers Subscription Content

    YouTube Considers Subscription Content

    YouTube might be considering adding subscription content to its streaming platform, in a bid to attract video from larger media corporations. Any potential deal wouldn’t affect existing content with any sort of paywall, but YouTube might seek to incorporate live sports, music and entertainment offerings, according to the New York Post.

    It was recently reported that historically free video platform Hulu is moving toward having its users authenticate their accounts by entering in a pay-service account number from satellite or cable providers. Pay service Netflix has produced a new season of Arrested Development, and even Amazon has been said to be in talks regarding creating an original series of its own. No word on whether YouTube might delve into creating original content, but big media companies have been weary of posting their shows on the platform for free, considering YouTube’s ad-only business model, regardless of the fact that its 800 million users stream about three billion hours of video per month, with projected ad sales of $2 billion to $3 billion per year.

    Google-owned YouTube presently has a movie rental service, and also streams pay-per-view cricket games via a partnership with WillowTV. CEO Salar Kamangar hinted at a possible premium subscription service at an industry event in January – “We’re a media platform and we want to have a business model that media partners demand.”

    A YouTube spokesperson commented on the matter, “We have long maintained that different content requires different types of payment models. The important thing is that, regardless of the model, our creators succeed on the platform and viewers find more content to watch”, adding “There are a lot of our content creators that believe they would benefit from subscriptions.”

  • Facebook Now Testing Offers For Online Retailers

    Facebook Now Testing Offers For Online Retailers

    The recently launched Facebook Offers beta allows businesses of all types to create coupons for their fans on Facebook. The program takes aim at other coupon services such as Groupon and one of community newspapers’ last reliable sources of revenue – the weekly coupon mailer. While Facebook Offers isn’t quite ready to take the place of a super-saver, online coupons offering discounts and deals for fans of larger retailers’ Facebook pages can now be spotted in those fans’ news feeds. The only problem is the redemption of the Offers, which use email as a middle-man and still require a user to physically go to a retail location.

    This week, Facebook began testing a different kind of Offers that includes redemption codes for online retailers. TechCrunch’s Josh Constine has confirmed with Facebook that that the site is testing a version of Offers that will use a “promo code or special link to click through for a discount on off-site purchases.” The codes and links may show up in more than just offers, though, and could be included in ads and sponsored stories. Facebook is testing the feature in a closed beta, and there is no word on when it could be made public in the way Facebook Offers now is.

    Given the ubiquity of Facebook, its Offers feature for businesses is a masterful tactical move. It provides businesses large and small with an incentive to have a presence on the social networking platform. Facebook users now have more reason to “Like” a businesses’ Facebook page, providing retailers the opportunity to build a community of shoppers. It’s a way for Facebook to insert ads into user’s news feeds without forcing them on users. And when businesses get a glimpse of how effective the Offers can be just in user’s news feeds, that should translate into ad and sponsored story Offers revenue for Facebook.

    What do you think? Is my analysis of Facebook’s Offers off-base? Will you “Like” online retailers simply for the offers? Leave a comment below and let me know.

    (via TechCrunch)

  • The Daily Gets An iPhone App, Cheaper Subscriptions

    The Daily Gets An iPhone App, Cheaper Subscriptions

    Just over a year after its launch last February, news magazine app The Daily has finally made its way to the iPhone. The app went live in the iOS App Store today. The iPhone app has a separate, cheaper set of subscription options than the iPad version. You can pay monthly for $1.99 per month, or get a full year for $19.99. On the iPad version of the app, individual issues of the magazine are $0.99, and a full year’s subscription is $39.99.

    The app is not universal. That is to say, the iPhone app is separate from the iPad version. For those who have subscriptions in the iPad version, you get the content on the iPhone version for free. All you have to do is sign into the iPhone app with the same credentials you use in the iPad version.

    The Daily launched in February of 2011. It was the first iPad-only news magazine, and introduced in-app subscriptions to iOS apps. It has proven to be a fairly popular news magazine, and was even the first news organization to publish the name of one of the women who filed a sexual harassment complaint against former Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain.

    The Daily for iPhone is available as a free download from the iOS App Store. Subscriptions are purchased from within the app.

    Are you a subscriber to The Daily? Are you excited to see the magazine making its way to the iPhone? Let us know what you think in the comments.

  • Netflix Stock Drops, Subscription Growth Projected to Slow

    Netflix Stock Drops, Subscription Growth Projected to Slow

    Netflix stock has been up and down lately, and it’s easy to understand why. Before the infamous summer of 2011, people always spoke very highly about Netflix, its ability to maintain steady growth, and the company’s desire to expand its streaming service into international markets. After a series of serious and unfortunate missteps — including the short-lived decision to split its DVD and streaming services into two separate entities — the company can’t seem to catch a break. Even with a strong ending to the first quarter, stocks still dropped during after-hours trading on Monday.

    Investors seem a little concerned about a forecast that suggests subscription growth will slow during the second quarter, despite the fact that Netflix added nearly 1.7 million members since the beginning of the year. Traditionally, April through June has been a particularly slow time for the company in terms of drawing new subscribers into its fold. Analysts projects that Netflix will only add a paltry 200,000 new users during the 2Q, a fact which may have caused the company’s stocks to take an estimated 16 drop yesterday.

    First quarter revenue, however, was up 21% from last year.

    CEO Reed Hastings is hoping to combat the subscription issue by focusing on original content, a strategy which includes bringing the cult television series “Arrested Development” back for another full season. Unfortunately, this particular show doesn’t start production until sometime this summer, which means that Hastings and company will have to wait until sometime next year to see if their pricy gamble will pay off.

    The company’s recent problems haven’t stopped Hastings from taking home an incredible amount of money as compensation for hurting the company’s reputation. Between his stock options and his regular salary, Hastings will reportedly bring home nearly $9.3 million. Not bad for a guy who alienated his subscribers by increasing their monthly rates and confusing the bejesus out of everyone by attempting to split the company into two entities.

    All of this bad news is going down right as other companies are looking to take a section of the market away from Netflix. Amazon, Wal-Mart, and Comcast are offering streaming services, though none of them has the selection that Netflix currently offers.

    For the time being, anyway.

  • Adobe CS6 Detailed, Embraces HTML5

    Adobe CS6 Detailed, Embraces HTML5

    Fans of Adobe have no doubt been waiting for the release of CS6 since it was first announced. The creative types have already got a small taste of what CS6 offers with the successful open beta for Photoshop CS6. The other software tools are now getting detailed in full.

    Adobe CS6 is going to be comprise of 14 CS6 applications and four Creative Suites. These includes Adobe CS6 Design and Web Premium, Design Standard, Production Premium and the Master Collection. The company is also launching the Adobe Creative Cloud with the release of CS6 which allows users to download and use all of the tools that come with CS6 for a monthly fee.

    “Creatives get a ton of innovation across CS6, with milestone releases of all our flagship products,” said David Wadhwani, senior vice president, Digital Media Business, Adobe. “With CS6 and Creative Cloud, we’re also introducing new products, new mobile workflows and advanced publishing capabilities that show we are laser-focused on ensuring design, Web and video pros have everything they need for the delivery of high-impact content and apps.”

    The flagship product of CS6 is obviously Photoshop. The key changes that are coming with CS6 is the Adobe Mercury Graphics engine that allows users to see instant results from common tools they use including Liquify, Puppet Warp, Transform and Lighting Effects. Photoshop also has new and improved content-aware features.

    Illustrator is getting a revamped interface and a new image tracing engine. It is powered by the Mercury Performance System for increased speed on 64-bit systems for Windows and Mac.

    InDesign promises to streamline the creation of multiple layouts from a single set of content. It’s powered by the new Adaptive Design Tools which include Alternate Layout, Liquid Layout, Content Collector Tools and Linked Content.

    Adobe has also revealed a new application called Adobe Muse. It promises to allow creators to make HTML5-powered Web sites without having to write any code.

    Speaking of HTML5, Adobe is fully embracing the Web technology to its fullest. Some of this is seen in creators being able to integrate HTML5 animations made with Adobe Edge into Dreamweaver projects. Dreamweaver is also being integrated with PhoneGap which allows developers to create native mobile applications across multiple platforms.

    In a surprising move that shows Adobe isn’t all about pushing their own platform, they have included an easy tool in their Flash Professional Toolkit that allows developers to convert Flash applications to HTML5 via CreateJS.

    Adobe Premiere CS6 is another tool that many creators are no doubt excited about. The excitement is warranted since Adobe is adding dozens of new features including the new Adobe Mercury Playback Engine which now supports OpenCL on MacBook Pros.

    The company thinks that creators are really going to like what they’ve done with After Effects calling it the most significant release in a decade. This is partially due to the new Global Performance Cache which saves previews instantly which cuts down the time you have to spend going between projects.

    Production Premium is also getting some new features from Adobe Prelude, which “streamlines logging and ingest workflows in post-production,” and SpeedGrade, which “contains powerful finishing tools for film finishing and color grading.”

    Adobe Audition is adding new features to help with audio post-production. These features include real-time clip stretching, which allows users to stretch clips to fit an edit, and Automatic Speech Alignment, a tool that enables automated dialogue analysis.

    Adobe is also announcing a third-party API called Adobe Mercury Transmit that allows “broadcast video monitoring to connect directly into the Mercury Playback Engine via third-party cards from AJA, Blackmagic Design and Matrox.

    Of course, the most important thing when it comes to new Adobe products is the price. These tools are usually pretty expensive and that is still the case here. Adobe CS6 Design and Web Premium will cost $1,899 with Adobe CS6 Design Standard costing $1,299. As for the other releases, Adobe CS6 Production Premium will cost $1,899 and Adobe CS6 Master Collection will go for $2,599. As always, previous customers can upgrade for a smaller fee.

    As mentioned above, Adobe is also introducing Adobe Creative Cloud with this release which allows users to have access to all of the above tools at a monthly rate. If you sign up for an annual membership, the use of CS6 will only run you $49.99 a month. If you just go by a month-to-month membership, the cost will be $74.99 a month.

    The retail and Creative Cloud release of CS6 is expected to happen with the next 30 days. If you so wish, you can preorder the software now. If you want to see all the new features for yourself, Adobe will be hosting a CS6 launch event livestream at 10 a.m. PDT (1 p.m. EST) on their Web site.