Tag Archives: online retail

New Amazon.com Cashout Option!

Check out the brand new Amazon.com cashout option for MindField Online Panelists!

That’s right, starting now, in addition to our check request and PayPal cashout options, you can also choose to get your dough in the form of an Amazon.com Gift Card*! Whether you just hit your $5 threshold, or you’ve been saving up, you can request an Amazon.com Gift Card* at no extra cost to you. You receive a gift card code via email, you enter the code number at Amazon.com, and you go nuts!

We hope you enjoy this new convenience…let us know!

And now the legal mumbo-jumbo!

*Amazon.com Gift Cards (“GCs”) sold by McMillion Research, an authorized and independent reseller of Amazon.com Gift Cards. Amazon, Amazon.com, the Amazon.com logo, and the Amazon Gift Cards logo are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates. GCs may be used only for purchases of eligible goods on Amazon.com or its affiliated website Endless.com. GCs cannot be redeemed for purchases of gift cards. Except as required by law, GCs cannot be reloaded, resold, transferred for value, redeemed for cash, or applied to any other account. See www.amazon.com/gc-legal

No Escape from Ads?

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Watching TV, it seems like there is a commercial every 5 minutes. On your PC, it’s hard to escape the pop-ups. By comparison, your mobile device is sort of an escape from Ad-madness – but maybe not for long.

According on an advertising exec quoted in a recent article in Adweek, advertisers know that:

There are over three times the number of mobile subscribers as there are TV subscribers, he said. Globally, it’s the most adopted technology and media channel in history. The engagement rates are higher. And inventory, thanks to 24-hour access to users, is unmatched.

Engagement rates means that, unlike the TV that blasts ads at you without your consent, online you choose to Click Here, meaning you are interested in the product on some level.

So, far, mobile ad spending is a drop in the bucket compared to TV, but a lot of advertising geniuses expect that to change. The question is, how will you feel when there’s just as much advertising on your mobile as there is on TV and PC? Let us know!

*  BTW, the art department spent literally minutes on the opening picture!

Marketers Targeting Smartphone Moms

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I see a young mom at the grocery pushing a fully loaded cart with a 2-year-old boy in the seat. Standby for the screaming tantrum, right? Except not. All is at peace…because the kid’s watching cartoons on mom’s iPad.

About a week later, I saw this article on WashingtonPost.com that says that moms with smartphones:

…are becoming a new kind of shopping force online. A decade ago, these women were single and childless 18- to 34-year-olds who captured the hearts of Madison Avenue marketing executives with their voracious consumer appetites. Now, they are older and often in charge of the household wallet.

 Apparently, advertisers have been studying the habits of regular “desktop moms” for years, coming up with new ways to grab their attention. But now, mobile moms are busting out, becoming the fastest growing segment of smartphone users. And they are among the Web’s biggest spenders, either buying directly from mobile apps or researching products that they buy later.

So what’s your favorite way that your mobile device interacts with your shopping habits? Research? Couponing? Purchases? Or simply shutting up your 2 year old? Let us know!

e-Groceries?

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Online purchases of consumer packaged goods from disposable diapers to processed food will more than double to $25 billion by 2014, information and measurement company Nielsen said on Monday.

Yahoo.com News Article

Wal-Mart, Kroger and Amazon are all getting into the game: Online ordering of groceries. Right now, about 2% of all purchases are made online and, as the quote says, that’s going to double in the next couple of years.

You may recall companies trying this back in the late-90’s. Most of them became victims of the dot-com bust. e-Commerce has come a long way since then, as well as some new ideas about shipping and distribution.

Lately, there have been some product-specific online retailers that have had some success-names like Soap.com and Diapers.com. Amazon recently snapped them up for about a half-billion dollars, so I guess they’re serious about the trend!

So, what do you think? Have you ordered groceries online? Would you? What kinds of things would you order? Let us know!

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Stay tuned for our next post, when we will meet the winners of our 10,000 Facebook Fan Giveaway!!

Consumed with Apps!

This was the year that smartphones and tablets like the iPad and Galaxy outsold desktop and laptop PCs. So, has this development changed the way we spend our time with mobile apps? Well, if you consider DOUBLING it a change, then yes!

There’s a group called Flurry that monitors the mobile app industry – something like 85,000 apps – and they have conducted a study of how our behavior has changed over the last year. Here’s a chart:

That’s a 91% increase! And how are we dividing up that time?

  • 47% Games
  • 32% Social Networking
  • 09% News
  • 07% Entertainment
  • 05% Other

How about you? Did you get a smartphone or tablet this year? Has your behavior changed? Let us know!

AND EVERYBODY HAVE A FUN, SAFE INDEPENDENCE DAY!!!!

Digital Word of Mouth

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They always say that word of mouth is the purest form of advertisement. That hasn’t changed. What has changed is that, 20 years ago, your word of mouth testimonial might be heard by 5 or 10 of your friends. Today, thanks to your mobile phone, your word of mouth goes out to hundreds via Facebook, Twitter and text message.

And, according to a recent article at Mobile Commerce Daily, retailers are starting to pay attention – enough to commission a survey that said:

  • 46% of consumers told their friends about a positive retail experience
  • 40% told their friends about a negative experience
  • 18% commented via Facebook
  • 8% commented via Twitter, and
  • 32% commented via SMS (text message)

What do you think? Have you taken your word of mouth and Gone Digital? Are you more likely to praise or complain? Let us know!

Android Surging

Last time we were talking about how iPad is running away with the personal tablet computer market. Today, we look at the flip side, that is, the fact that Android-enabled smartphones seem to be gaining more and more attention from app developers.

An article in Mobile Marketer says:

The number of U.S. consumers who owned a smartphone during the three-month period (Feb-Apr 2011) grew 13 percent for a total of 74.6 million…Android’s market share (has grown to) 36.4%, while Apple’s iOS platform has a total of 26%

Marketers and app developers looking to reach out to smartphone users (soon to be up to half of phones purchased) are paying more attention to Android. So, while iPhone and iPad users have gotten a lot of attention for their nice selection of apps, Android users are starting to catch up!

So, what do you say Android users? What do you like about your phone? What are your favorite apps?

iPad Pulling Away?

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This is not an endorsement of any particular personal tablet computer. But chances are, if you or someone you know has one, it’s an iPad. Lately, you are seeing lots of ads for competitive tablets. But, a recent article in the New York Times, entitled “IPad Rivals Fail to Gain Traction”… says that, um, iPad rivals are failing to gain traction.

According to an analyst’s report issued by JPMorgan Chase:

…companies building products to compete with the iPad have slowed production by as much as 10 percent since this time last March. At that time, the report said, competing tablet companies created 81 million tablets; this year the number has fallen to 73 million.

You don’t have to ask an iPad user if he’s happy – and you might not want to, because he won’t shut up about it 😉 …But are there any non-iPad tablet users out there, like Motorola Xoom and the Samsung Galaxy? What do you think? Are you happy with your device?

e-Book Upset!

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Remember the shock of learning last year that men’s colored briefs outsold tightie-whities for the first time in history? I mean, who could forget? Well, this is just like that – only digital!

According to an article in the Wall Street Journal, Amazon.com is now selling more electronic books than actual printed books.

 Since April 1, Amazon has sold 105 Kindle books for every 100 print books sold. The company has sold more than three times as many Kindle books so far this year as it did at the same time a year ago.

Imagine that. It took colored underwear 75 years to overtake white. E-books have done it in four years! It’s a $1 billion business, and they think it will triple in the next 5 years.

How about you? Do you use an e-reader (like Kindle or Nook) or are you old school? Why or why not?

More Happy Facebook Fans!

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Time again to update our “Panelist Reviews” page on the blog site. Lots of new comments, including this recent gem from Tammy:

I have been a member of MindField since September 2004. I have done in home product tests as well as take some very interesting surveys. This is by far one of the better survey panels there are out there. I have tried other survey companies but no others have come close to being as good as MindField.

So, check it out! And thanks Tammy…and all our enthusiastic fans!