Tag Archives: consumer preferences

Blackberry Blackout equals Outage Outrage!

2 Comments
Blackberry sends sadface. Millions without service do not receive it.

The longest BlackBerry outage in many years left customers outraged this week, threatening to cost the granddaddy of all smartphones more business when it’s already struggling to keep up in a crowded marketplace.  – Huffington Post

It’s not like things weren’t already going sour at Blackberry. They have seen their market share drop in the past year – from roughly equal worldwide with Android (19% vs. 18%,) to less than a third (12% vs. 43%.)  But last week’s global blackout now has users rethinking their commitment to Blackberry, especially with the big launch of iPhone 4S underway.

The big, three-day hiccup affected millions of users worldwide. Now, to soothe angry subscribers, Blackberry is offering $100 worth of free downloads including SIMS 3, Bejeweled, Photo Editor Ultimate, Vlingo Virtual Assistant and more. For its enterprise customers, Blackberry is offering a free month of tech support.

So, do you use Blackberry or know someone who does? Were you affected? If so, do the free downloads make up for it, or is it too little, too late?

The Kitchen is Closed

4 Comments

We all have a defunct restaurant from yesteryear that we miss – usually some mom and pop diner or local steak house. But who knew we would mourn Bennigan’s or Don Pablo’s? Well, it’s come to this, people.

 There is a school of thought that says the restaurant business is always a good business because people need to eat. A glance at the sales of many of America’s largest restaurant chains over the past decade quickly dispels that myth.             MSN Business.com

Here’s the deathwatch:

  1. Bennigan’s: This nationwide, Irish-themed casual-dining restaurant has 87% fewer locations than it did in 2001.
  2. Ground Round: This casual-dining burger and steak chain lost 81% of its locations in the last 10 years.
  3. Bakers Square: Serves breakfast, lunch and dinner, but is best known for its pies. Has 70% fewer locations than 2001.
  4. Damon’s: I always knew it as a rib joint, but later became a sports bar. 72% decline.
  5. Don Pablo’s: Nationwide Tex-Mex chain. 70% decline.
  6. Gloria Jean’s Coffees. In its 30-year history, it has expanded to Australia, where it still thrives. Here? 73% decline.
  7. Big Boy. This one I don’t get. Frisch’s is the Big Boy chain back home in Ohio, and I have seen ZERO decline. Every one of the dilapidated shops from the 60’s has been renovated. But, the overall national chain is down 65%.
  8. Tony Roma’s. Tony still has a large international presence, but here at home is down 72%
  9. Country Kitchen. Buffet place, right? Down 74%.
  10. Black Angus Steakhouse. Primarily out west, there are 46 BA’s today, down from 107 in 2001 – a 57% drop.

So, any of your favorites on the list? Who did they miss? Let us know!

Steve Jobs 1955-2011

1 Comment

It was just a couple of weeks ago that we were discussing Apple impresario Steve Jobs’ retirement. Now we have learned of his passing.

By no means am I in the die-hard Steve Jobs Admiration Society. Not until recently, when I worked for a company whose entire business was making accessories for Apple products, did I give Mr. Jobs much thought. But I have to say that he was a trailblazer. He didn’t just make awesome products to satisfy our needs – he anticipated our needs and invented an entire industry to meet them. In this way, he has been (rightly, I believe) likened to a modern-day Thomas Edison.

So today, that’s what I would like to focus upon, as opposed to speculating on the effect on Apple’s shares. Just yesterday, we had the first big Apple teleconference without him, and many were under-whelmed. Who knows? Maybe they were anticipating the news.

So what do you think?

The Return of Layaway

12 Comments

Until recently, layaway was on the “endangered strategies list,” replaced by increased use of credit and gift cards. So why bring back this dinosaur of a payment practice? It’s simple…our economy. With banks being more cautious, consumer credit lines are withering.       Harvard Business Review

Everybody remembers layaway, back in the days before they gave out credit cards to anybody with a pulse. I remember layaway as that cruddy window in the back of the store, where you stood in line with your mom and all the other bored kids and their moms, sweating to death in your big old parka and getting nauseous from all the cigarette smoke. Good times.

Anyway, layaway is back in a lot of stores, but Wal-Mart is really making some noise. Their plan is probably pretty typical. Specifically…

 it kicks off on 10/17 and runs through 12/16. …an item has to cost at least $15, and the total minimum order is $50. [It is] limited to toys and electronics (and most cell phones aren’t eligible), and it applies only to in-store purchases. You have to put down at least 10 percent of the cost of the total order when you put the items on layaway…you don’t get charged interest on deferred purchases, [but] the layaway program isn’t free: Walmart is charging a one-time non-refundable $5 service fee for the service, and you’ll get hit with a $10 fee if the layaway order isn’t paid in full and picked up or canceled by the end of the day on December 16.  Consumer Reports

So, what do you think? Will you be taking advantage of this or other layaway programs? If you do, put me down for a Lost in Space robot, a Six Million Dollar Man doll action figure and an Evel Knievel dirtbike!

Banking on Your Trust

3 Comments

Despite a raft of new regulations and capital requirements designed to protect consumers and strengthen banks, consumer confidence in financial institutions continues to plummet.   – AmericanBanker.com

This according to a financial industry consulting group called Center for Financial Services Innovation. Here are the grim statistics:

  • 87% of consumers have little or no confidence in the trustworthiness of their bank.
  • 55% say institutions don’t offer clear and simple policies.
  • 53% don’t feel financial institutions share customer values.
  • Almost 50% lack confidence that banks live up to their promises and commitments.
Yours free when you roll over your 401k

In response, the Center for Financial Services Innovation is making some radical suggestions. You can read about them here. Basically they are saying, instead of making clever commercials about how they help their customers get ahead and improve their lives, banks should actually DO those things!

Freaky, I know.

It’s interesting…people are often more pessimistic in the broad view, while looking more positively at their own circumstance. (Congress sucks, but my representative is cool.) So, what do you think? Is the banking industry full of crooks, or just misunderstood? Are you happy with your own bank? Let us know!

Target.com’s “Missoni Impossible”

6 Comments

If you are totally in the dark – or a dude – Missoni is an Italian knitwear designer. They are the latest “big get” for mega-retailer Target. They teamed up to provide Target shoppers with their wide-ranging line of EXTREMELY popular knitwear. But the big launch didn’t go so smoothly!

Comedian Louis C.K. has a bit about people becoming violently frustrated with their smartphones: “Come ON! Download! Stupid thing!” Louie says, “Could you relax? It has to go to outer space and back to provide you a convenience you couldn’t have imagined 10 years ago!”

Something to think about because, during last week’s big launch day, shoppers completely MELTED Target‘s online store, Target.com.  Millions of online shoppers saw the following message:

How can you stay mad at Toolbox Dog? He's got a little toolbox!

And how did they react? How do you think? According to the article, there was a whole lot of “What the ____? Bummer! Totally p*ssed off!” on all the discussion boards.

Meanwhile, the lucky shoppers who had gotten through and glommed up all the merchandise prior to the meltdown were already on eBay, reselling at premium prices.  Come on! These aren’t Beanie Babies or Cabbage Patch Kids!

So anyway, no big judgment here, other than to say if you are going to whip up a consumer frenzy, you’d better be able to handle the traffic! So how about you? Were you part of the madness? Did you score, or were you shut out? Let us know!

Qualifying for Surveys, Revisited

4 Comments

If you are a member of MindField Online Internet Panels – or any other reputable survey company – you know that it can be hard to qualify for surveys at times. Sometimes you respond to an invitation, begin to answer some of the background questions and, before you know it, the survey has “kicked you out.” That can be a bummer, and you have probably wondered why it happens. Today, we will try to explain.

We wrote that blog post about 10 months ago, referred people back to it from time to time, and eventually we made its own dedicated page. We wanted it to be permanently on display, because we know that Qualifying is an important topic, and often a sore subject.

As we say, MindField Online has a responsibility to get our members as many survey opportunities as we can. We also have a responsibility to our clients to get them good, detailed, usable data. Qualifying is where those two concerns meet.

So, we invite you to read the page, “Bringing Clarity to Online Survey Qualification” once again. You’ll learn more about the how and why of qualifying, as well as a few tips on improving your chances at completing more surveys.

MindField Facebook Fan Update for September

Once again, we have updated the Panelist Reviews page with a fresh batch of, um, panelist reviews from happy MindField Online Facebook fans. Lets take a look at them, including this white-hot chunk of satisfaction from Timmie – who seems to like exclamation points as much as WE do!

Timmie says: It sure makes you proud when you go to the store & find the product you tested knowing that you helped make it available to others!! Also, there’s a bunch of fine fun folk here. No auto response computers! Amazing what a relief it is to talk to real people!! You guys make this panel fun!!!!!

Read the rest here. And THANKS, MindField friends!!

Blogging Year in Review, el parte dos

3 Comments

Yesterday we began our two-part blogging year in review looking at the various pieces we did about the consumer testing industry in general, and MindField Online in particular. Today, let’s recall the ways we reached out to panelists like YOU!

We announced fun cash and prize giveaways, like

And when we reached those milestones and held the drawings, we featured the names, pictures and bios of as many of the winners as we could:

Early on, we reached out to long-time members and asked them to tell their stories:

We really wanted to do more of these, but we found that people are generally shy about too much attention.

Meanwhile, we began collecting satisfied members’ comments on Facebook. Back when we had about 5,000 fans, we made a blog post with a bunch of these comments. We kept updating them about every month or so, and finally decided they needed their own page. We update the Panelist Reviews page monthly, and it’s coming up next week!

Well, that’s the year in review! Thanks for everything, MindField Online friends and family…and stay tuned!

Blogging Year in Review, el parte uno

2 Comments

This week marks the one-year anniversary of MindField Online jumping into the world of social media, including the blog, our Facebook page and Twitter feed. In social media, old stuff tends to get buried under new, and useful info sometimes gets lost. So for this reason (as well as misplaced nostalgia) we take a two-part look at the past year.

We took time to learn about Consumer Testing. Some of it was “inside baseball,” as they say, others were pretty useful!

Along the way, we took time to discuss features, changes and improvements to the system, including

Looking back, one thing becomes clear: we use a LOT of exclamation points! Anyway, this is just SOME of the excitement we have perpetrated in the past year. More tomorrow, and THIS time it gets personal! Exclamation point!