Ecommerce & Web Marketing Research: October 21-31 2004

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October 31 2004

New articles - entrepreneur mindsets and strategies

Hot off the press, a couple of new articles. How did the big guys get so big? Pick up some strategies they use to turn successful online businesses into real money spinners. Also, what is the winning mindset and approach to online business? Some of my thoughts gathered based on the many successful entrepreneurs I've met over the years.

More domain name extensions?

Two new domain name suffixes may be released next year - ".post" for postal related groups and ".travel" for travel industry associations and organizations. 8 others including, including .jobs, .asia, and .mobi are still pending.

Often I'm asked the value of other domain name extensions such as .biz by ecommerce site owners. I still maintain that .com is the extension firmly embedded in the consciousness of users. A .com name should be registered as the primary domain wherever possible, unless the business is regional specific. Other TLD's can be purchased as secondary/redirects purely as a convenience to clients. 

Learn more about selecting a good domain name.

October 28 2004

Sender ID phoenix arises from the ashes

Last month, I mentioned that the Sender ID initiative, an anti-spam framework meant to verify that each email originates from the domain from which it claims, was dumped by a number of Microsoft's partners involved in the project - including AOL and major players in the Open Source Community. The project was then put on the back-burner.

Xmas ecommerce not so cheery?

According to Forrester research; Q3 US eCommerce sales totaled close to 33 billion dollars, a 28% over the previous year. Forrester researchers point out though that this figure only matches the sales figures of Q1 of this year; which they believe indicates that online retailers may have challenges in meeting optimistic sales targets for this Xmas season.

Pick up some tips on Xmas web marketing considerations.

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October 26 2004

20% of computers infected with viruses

As I've mentioned before in my research notes, often it's not the hackers that directly threaten the security of your online business - the biggest threat can come from your staff and clients.

A survey released by AOL in conjunction with the National Cyber Security Alliance has revealed some *very* disturbing results. Key findings from a sample of 329 participants:

• 20% of respondents systems were infected by viruses

• 6% of respondents were aware they had viruses

• 80% of systems examined had spyware/adware

• 33% of users had a firewall operational

• 14% of those with firewalls still had ports open

• 91% of computer owners with children under the age of 18 had no parental control software installed

• 72% of participants use their systems for "sensitive" transactions

• Over 70% felt their computer was "safe"

• 63% were aware of past virus infections

Scary stuff. 

Download this very interesting survey (PDF 44kb)
Learn more about securing home based online business

UK online advertising a decade old and booming

Wow - According to industry report, the tenth anniversary of UK online ads occurs this week. The first advertiser was supposedly telecommunications firm, AT&T. 

From 2002 to now, the UK ad market has boomed - according to Price Waterhouse, 1st quarter 2002 saw just over 30 million British pounds in online ad sales and the second quarter of 2004 is around the 130 million pound mark. Read more.

October 24 2004

Check clearing for the 21st century

Starting this week in the USA, banks will begin implementing the federal "Check 21" Act. This requires banks to accept digital substitute checks, transmitted electronically. This new process allows transfers between banks to be more rapid.

It's predicted that within three to five years, the time between writing a check to when it clears, i.e. your account is actually debited, will drop from several days to less than 24 hours. If you're one of the many businesses that juggles finances by writing checks in the knowledge that they won't clear for a couple of days - it may be wise to rethink this financial strategy as it may cost you dearly in overdraft fees or worse still - a tarnished image from bouncing checks :). Learn more about Check 21.

October 23 2004

Yahoo shelving PayDirect ecommerce service

"PayWhat?" you say? Yep, for the many millions of people who had never heard of it, Yahoo is closing its payment processing service and would be PayPal competitor, PayDirect . The reason - not enough accounts according to this MSNBC report. The reason there wasn't enough accounts? Well, in my opinion, after having been totally bamboozled by their mile long terms of service and then seeing it in action, I'm not surprised. 

PayPal definitely still seem to have this sector of the ecommerce wrapped up - I'm still yet to see a comparable service in this genre. RIP PayDirect; and may you never rear your ugly head again. Yahoo provides some great services, but this definitely wasn't one of them. 

Learn more about payment gateways, 3rd party payment processing and merchant accounts.

Shopping cart software Learn more about shopping carts or read our reviews of some the best shopping cart software around! Need to learn more about merchant accounts or payment processors? Try our ecommerce guides

Electronics top Xmas wish lists

Wondering what consumers are looking to purchase as gifts these holidays? 

76% of U.S. consumers plan to buy at least one consumer electronics product this year, according to a new survey released today by the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA).

What people are buying:

• consumer electronics gift certificate - 30 percent

• digital cameras - 29 percent

• dvd players - 25 percent

• plasma TV - 9 percent

The survey also found that the number one desired gift item this season is the plasma TV. Nine percent of CE gift buyers plan to purchase a plasma TV as a gift. Ranked in order following the plasma TV, other desired gifts this holiday season include the digital camera, a notebook or laptop computer, a color TV 27-inches or larger and a portable MP3 player.

What people are wanting in order of preference:

• plasma tv

• digital camera

• notebook

• TV 27" plus

• portable mp3 play

Hmm.. a little bit of difference between what people are buying and what people actually want - hopefully those gift certificates will take care of that :). Ah, how I love this time of the year. Discover how much I like the holidays and pick up some Xmas marketing tips in the tutorial that I dust off and republish each year :)

October 21 2004

Alternate browsers - security issues

Much hype about alternate browsers, and equally as much criticism about IE has been circulating of late. Over the last few months, while applauding the efforts of IE challengers, I've repeatedly stated this point - the only reason these alternate browsers don't have so many reported "holes" is because not enough people are using them yet. If one alternate browser became the industry leader, then I'm sure we'd see similar levels of security issues cropping up - such as recent reported threats originating in tabbed browsing features.

Wait for a couple of years and watch the amount of disk space that the alternate browsers start to gobble up as well.

The purists need to understand - software is software - it's all full of bugs; regardless of whether it's development is propelled by street savvy or monkish programmers. No point dumping on one company just because they were smart enough to respond to the market. It's we the consumers who are stupid - dump on us instead. Actually, dumping and berating us won't change things - market to us instead - the way the big guys did that won us over.

600,000 Social Security numbers at risk

A hacker accessed a computer at the University of Berkeley containing Social Security numbers and other personal data of around 600,000 Californians. Although the breach occurred on Aug. 30, it wasn't reported to government officials until September 21. A campus spokesman stated that there was no evidence to suggest that any of the data was copied, downloaded or utilized. Read more.

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