Link To Full Story: www.domainstryker.com
Well, they had a great run for a couple of years and then they started seeing more competition from smaller players who turned into big players, because that’s what always happens with time. People flock to where there is good or easy money. Then soon it didn’t make sense anymore to mess around with eBay, one of their best sales outlets so they said bye bye to it.
Now earlier this year, Amazon, the place where they sell close to two third’s of their stuff and do the most of their biz online started directly competing with them… Looks like Amazon saw an opportunity (analyzed all the sales data from last few years, looked into margins and added the inventory by going direct to manufacturer since there is some nice $$$ to be made) and that’s that.
Link To Full Story: lifehacker.com
Earlier this week we asked you to share your favorite site for setting up shop online. Now we're back with the results and an overview of the five best places to establish a web-based shop and build your online presence.
Big Cartel (Web-Based, Basic: Free/Premium: From $9.99 per month)
Big Cartel is an easy-to-use store building and shopping cart service marketed towards artists. They've designed their setup and control panel system with the attitude that you'd rather be creating stuff and working on your business instead of tinkering with your web site. The pricing structure at Big Cartel makes it easy to test the waters without an up front cost. You can set up a storefront and list up to 5 products with basic customization for free. From there they have the Platinum plan for $9.99/month and the Diamond plan for $19.99/month offering an increase in volume of products and level of customization. Big Cartel doesn't take a percentage of your sales with any sort of fees. Check out their example page to see the variety of designs their users are using—the shot above is from the storefront of Backseat Vintage.
Link To Full Story: www.elliotsblog.com
The best tip I can give to any web developer to make money is to be proactive in seeking out advertisers. Unless you have a really popular website, it’s most likely that you will have to seek out advertisers rather than waiting for them to come to you.
Visit competing websites and see who is advertising there and contact those companies directly. Install Google Adsense on your website and see what companies are advertising on your site via Google. If they’re small (not a lot of red tape in the marketing department), try to contact those companies and work out direct deals with them.
Link To Full Story: fragerfactor.blogspot.com
It's a well-known fact that the more steps a shopper must take in order to make a purchase, the less likely that purchase is. The same is true for shoppers on Facebook, of course, which is why San Francisco-based Payvmenthas developed a tool that lets them buy from vendors without ever leaving the site.
Now in beta, Payvment turns companies' Facebook fan pages from marketing platforms into sales platforms. Specifically, its Facebook app gives vendors everything they need to create a storefront on the social networking site, including a built-in, full-featured admin area. Installation takes 15 minutes, the company says; once it's done, Facebook users can shop and make purchases from that store without needing to leave Facebook.
Link To Full Story: domainnamewire.com
Also on the call, Google explained that it’s getting more involved with cost-per-action. Some e-commerce stores will provide Google with their product list and pricing, and then turn over advertising to Google. Google chooses when and where to display ads, and then gets a cut of sales — much like an affiliate program. It’s kind of like affiliate arbitrage for Google, except they get to bid on trademarks whereas most affiliates can’t.
Link To Full Story: gigaom.com
In the most basic implementation, advertisers will be able to bid on keywords to have their tweets featured in search results. But Twitter says also may eventually include the paid tweets in users’ regular tweet streams too, something that will surely be more controversial. Costolo said the company expects to decide whether to take that step before the end of the year.
Link To Full Story: adage.com
Shared by JohnH
This getting a lot of traction over the last few days.
Our process was to query data from hundreds of our brand clients to see what testable truths emerged -- and here's what we found: 10 rules that hold up across category and time.
1. The 1% Rule
In category after category, our data show that a small fraction of site visitors are responsible for a substantial portion of total site traffic. On average, the percentage of influential users (defined for our purposes simply as a visitor who's subsequent sharing actions result in at least one additional site visitor) on a given site is 0.6% and rarely above 4%. However, these influencers regularly generate 20%-50% of total site traffic and an even higher share of conversion (defined however a site owner so decides). To make social media marketing effective, marketers have to identify and engage -- and better recognize and reward -- these super-influentials.
Link To Full Story: www.newfoundnames.com
Shared by JohnH
I can haz all the power.
The latest change to the Google search results for mortgage related terms such as “mortgage rates”, “mortgage calculator”, “mortgage loan” and more show Google comparison ads in the #1 spot. From the dozen or terms I searched for Google is # 1 across the board.
Not only does this Google self serving ad bump out 1 of the 3 available positions usually available above the organic search results (btw where can I can get a radio button and 4 lines of text for a Google ad!) but it really kills lead generation in the mortgage industry unless you are a company willing to provide rates, a good faith estimate, APR information and more (see results below)
Link To Full Story: slatev.com
Shared by JohnH
Game changer. Have the sense that some cool stuff will come out of this, like... better ads.
How I Ran an Ad on Fox News
Arts and Life
March 18, 2010
Slate ad critic Seth Stevenson tries out a Google service that allows you to run your own commercial on national TV for as little as $100.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Link To Full Story: Web Publishing Blog
Wow. This guy didn’t even do it, he sold software that did it.
“On Tuesday, US Federal authorities filed criminal charges against Christopher Kennedy, a developer of cookie stuffing software. While the developer claims to have never engaged in cookie stuffing for his own benefit, he is being charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud. These charges carry a maximum fine of $250K and 5 years in prison. ”
Does this mean that affiliate networks who tweak pixels to fire only 90% of the time, scrub conversions, or under report sales conversions to their affiliates are committing wire fraud?
Its no secret that this is an industry standard — not an exception. Just sign up for an affiliate network back end and learn all about how affiliate fraud is facilitated.
