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PayPal Enters the Social Couponing Fray

December 29th, 2011 | Posted by admin in Business strategy | Internet economy | Mobile | Social media | social technology | Technology - (0 Comments)

During this latest recession, saving money on everything from eating out to mani-pedis has become chic. The newest social couponing player’s plans are detailed in Bloomberg’s “EBay’s PayPal Bets on 103 Million Users to Target Groupon: Tech.” The company will offer coupons tailored to users’ buying habits and mobile-phone locations.

“PayPal is also seeking to use mobile deals to get a head start in wireless payments, as credit-card companies collaborate to create a standard using near-field communication technology.” “The coupons are supposed to keep customers using EBay beyond the payment process, with the goal of helping the Internet’s largest online marketplace to widen its user base.” “As part of the larger push into wireless payments, PayPal will offer a so-called mobile wallet — usable through phone applications or a PayPal card, or even a name and personal- identification number — that holds a consumer’s information from credit and debit cards from multiple providers.”

Consumer behavior drives this market. Groupon and LivingSocial had an estimated combined 73% market share in daily deals in October 2011 with local efforts having some success. While PayPal may steal some of that, will it be able to siphon off enough? Facebook couldn’t and exited the field. A lack of consumer loyalty and increasing coupon competition have merchants tiring of the trend. And while you’ll always have penny-pinchers, how long before consumers experience overload and become immune to daily deals?

Jim Daniels, December 29, 2011

Survey Identifies Mobile BI Leader

December 28th, 2011 | Posted by admin in Business strategy | Mobile | Strategy | Technology - (0 Comments)

One of technology’s hottest markets is mobile BI, and Market Watch’s “Information Builders Ranks Amongst Leaders in Latest Dresner Mobile BI Report” highlights one of the hottest players.

“The company was ranked as one of the leaders in a new Dresner Advisory Report, “Mobile Business Intelligence Market Study,” scoring a 16 out of 22 possible points for the strength of its WebFOCUS Mobile BI platform. Dresner analyzed 24 different vendors for the report and recognized Information Builders as a leading provider of mobile BI technology, based upon mobile platform coverage and integration and support for key Business Intelligence features and functions.”

The survey also provided some insight into the high gain potential of mobile BI. Sixty-eight percent of respondents now see the technology as either critical or very important to their business, compared to 52 percent in 2010. The proliferation of and upgrades to smart phones and tablets will continue to drive this sector.

Jim Daniels, December 28, 2011

To Hire or Not to Hire

December 27th, 2011 | Posted by admin in Business strategy | employment | Mobile | Technology - (0 Comments)

“Hiring Your First Mobile Tech Project Manager” can seem a little daunting but with more and more businesses shifting to mobile applications, hiring a project manager can be a good way to keep everything on track and make some high market value gains at the same time.

“To a certain degree, management of some or all mobile devices has developed organically into a user-based set of tasks, at least up until the most dire or complicated scenarios. If that’s been your department’s experience, it may or may not be meeting the challenge, especially if your company is lucky enough to be experiencing growth right now.”

By utilizing available documents that give avid descriptions of a project managers duties and responsibilities can help your budding or existing business train staff to oversee the agenda. Per the usual, desired candidates should be responsible for creation, syndication, and support based upon your preferred mobile media device.

Leslie Radcliff, December 27, 2011

Winning, Losing, Setting the Bar

December 22nd, 2011 | Posted by admin in Internet economy | Investment strategy | IPO | Social media - (0 Comments)

If you need to know what is up, what is down, and what needs to be left alone in the world of stocks, then the Wall St. Cheat Sheet is a good place to start. In a recent report “Tech Business Weekly Recap: Zynga IPO Flops, Netflix Rumors Fizzle” we get a good look at not only Zynga and Netflix but also some other pretty prominent fixtures.

Netflix has made large pre-market gains thanks to David Faber confirming that Verizon will not be buying Netflix. The company came under fire in recent months due to a huge price jump and lack of communications with it’s consumers. Zynga however, is having no such luck.

“Zynga was given starting coverage with an underperform and $7 PT by Sterne Agee’s Arvind Bhatia ahead of the social gaming giant’s IPO. Bhatia thinks Zynga’s growth is slowing even faster than what is obvious at first.”

Zynga is responsible for creating the social media gaming hit FarmVille. Pandora, Groupon and Focus Media are experiencing waves of the negative variety but with the waxing and waning of consumer addiction and attention, it could really go either way in 2012.

Leslie Radcliff, December 22, 2011

Security Risks Paramount in 2012

December 21st, 2011 | Posted by admin in Business strategy | Mobile | News | Technology - (0 Comments)
Tech Journal is helping small businesses stay alert during 2012. With their article “Cyber Criminals Will Target Small Business, the Cloud, Mobile and Social Networks in 2012″ they help layout areas that have a good chance of being targeted.
According to the write-up:
“The events of 2011 suggest that the cyber security landscape will find pulic and private organizations are still on unsteady footing….Traditional pain points for organizations include mobile technologies, incident response and regulatory requirements will intensify as new and developing challenges surface in 2012.”
Mobile technology threats will be at the forefront of the security threat issue. Mobile technology is changing so fast that security measures will be hard pressed to keep up. Social media can expect to see a bombardment of attacks on user profiles, It hits especially hard because many small start-ups and small businesses operate their ad campaigns via social media. If you have a security issue and someone starts spamming in your businesses good name, it creates a problem that is not easily solved.
The article makes it clear that governing agencies are the driving force behind security initiatives once breaches become too costly. It is well worth the read to find out the additional security threats that may come along.

Leslie Radcliff, December 21,2012