There was a time when Microsoft could dominate any space they set their sights on.  Time and again they would play catch up and leverage their operating system hegemony to dominate particular market segments.  They did this most successfully with Microsoft Office Suite.  Like most people at the time I really liked Lotus 123, WordPerfect and dBase which dominated their respective spaces under the pre-Windows DOS operating system.  When Microsoft launched Windows perhaps it wasn't a huge surprise that early versions of Word, Excel and FoxPro/Access worked much better and it wasn't long before they dominated their segments.
 
When MS realized that they had all but missed the boat with the internet and infamously bundled Internet Explorer with their operating system, they got into legal trouble with the US government for monopoly practices. Microsoft was found to have abused its monopoly position by attempting reduce Navigator's usage share by giving IE away, among other things. It still didn't save Netscape however.

That approach can no longer work in today's world because there is less emphasis on the desktop and desktop apps.  Windows Mobile is floundering (perhaps it is time for MS to buy Nokia?). No one is using Zune (how many of you have even heard of MS's rival to iPod?).  Who uses MSN anymore?  And Bing is not overtaking Google any time soon.
 
There are clearly some winners. I do use Xbox, Kinnect and Windows Media Center and really like them.  Windows 7 is good (lord knows it couldn't be any worse than Vista).  But MS seems to be producing more misses than hits these days and the world is moving on very quickly.
 
This week I downloaded IE9 and realized that I can't access my SharePoint files through our VPN using it.  When I used Chrome and Firefox however it works just fine. Ugh.
 
Microsoft isn't going away any time soon; however they are becoming more reminiscent of IBM in the early 90's when they were trying to keep a foothold on the PC computer space.  Does anyone remember OS/2 anymore?  

The Social Search. How it Works:

Google and Bing are changing the way we are use the internet..... again.  Social Search has been created and both Bing and Google have their own takes on it.  So what is it? 

Social Search is a new addition to the old search engine that allows users to opt-in to having search results come from content created by friends and connections in their social networks. These results would be included with the search results from the web.  The difference between the two? Bing has Facebook, Google has Twitter. 

If you are anything like me, you are already using your social media platforms to search for anything from places to eat to apartments for rent. With the new social search that both Google and Bing are offering up, I can simply log into my Google (or Bing) account and search one place which will produce results from people in my social network and the web.  This produces a lattice of information that has specific relevance to me; it is my network after all. 

I recently moved to Vancouver.  I have a few friends here, but for the most part, the friends I've made are also new to the city.  When I was on the hunt for a great Mexican restaurant, I did what most of us do, I googled "Mexican in Vancouver".  The Google map appeared with pink dots all over it as to where I could find Mexican food in Vancouver, phone numbers and addresses included, but no great reviews. 

With the advent of the Social Search, I can now scan my social networks to see if any of my friends have said anything about "Mexican in Vancouver".  Instead of going to a dodgy hole-in-the-wall spot, I can go to Topanga Café for some delicious margaritas and well deserved burritos (after all, it was really tough to find).   The result of my search is not only personalized for me by my friends who "Like" it, but is actually put into the top results based on my own social network.

The great Benefits of the Social Search? Reduced spam, increased relevance, human judgment, relevance determined by peers, and results from your network that are not stale dated.

The Cons of the Social Search: What do you like on Facebook?

I "Like" a lot of things on Facebook. I "Like" Justin Bieber, and I "Like" being a part of the Young Seniors of Oak Bay Group.  No offense to Justin Bieber, but I'm not actually a fan, I simply think it's funny to be one and I can be sure I'm not the only one who "Likes" things they know nothing about.

So the relevance of all searches could be skewed by my impish tendencies to like idiotic things.

The Social Search will no doubt be a game changer in SEO, and the way we use the internet. For now, just be wary of whose word you're choosing to trust and be choosey about what you "Like". 

Recently, I wrote an article on group coupons that was posted on this blog.  It was tweeted at 8:45am on November 17th.  Then it got covered up by another tweet quite quickly which got me all bent out of shape.

So the marketing department kindly tweeted about it again at 3:45pm on the same day so that they no longer had to hear my complaints.

The click difference between the two tweets was startling.

The tweet at 8:45 am Pacific/11:45 am Eastern said:

New on Webnamesblog.ca: "Improving on the Group Coupon Phenomenon - Winning Deals for Consumers and Retailers"

The link to the blog post got a total of 3 clicks and only 1 on the first day it was posted.

The tweet at 3:45 pm Pacific/6:45 pm Eastern said:

Are you loving or leaving group coupons? Here's Lisa's take on how the group coupon phenomenon can be improved on:

The link to the blog post got a total of 22 clicks over two days.

We could look at the best time of day to post and what time zone most of your followers are in etc - but I would rather look at the content of the tweet - which one is better?

The first tweet tells you it's on our blog and it has a fairly dense title. It's off-putting in that it shouts "I could be a long and boring article".

The second tweet is friendly and speaks directly to the follower. It assumes the follower has an opinion about Groupon and their ilk. It assumes everyone on Twitter knows about group coupons full stop.

The word "take" suggests that the article will be short, snappy and have a controversial bent.

By asking a question in the tweet, you are starting the engagement process - the follower clicks the link, reads the article and hopefully leaves a comment. Maybe they retweet or reply to the original tweet.

The general rule of thumb is, if you have something interesting to say, post your tweet twice in one day so you can hit both East and West time zones.

My rule of thumb is, if you have something interesting to say, make your tweet inviting and conversational and your followers will engage with it.

Read Lisa's recent articles about Group Coupons:

• Improving on the Group Coupon Phenomenon - Winning Deals for Consumers and Retailers
• Retailers and Group Coupons - Should you participate? One Gal's Opinion

For disclosure purposes, I subscribe to every group coupon program that is available in Vancouver. I do this, not because I am cheap, but because I like to keep an eye on what is happening in the group couponing industry.

The business model for group buying should be:  volume purchases of goods should allow the manufacturer to produce it more cheaply and then pass those savings onto the consumer.

An example of this is books. The book store pays 40% less of the cover price for a book. If the book is $10, the book store pays $6 to the publisher. If a bookstore takes the book as non returnable, they get another 50% off or so.

If the book store is Amazon and they need a million copies of "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo", they call Penguin and say we want the book for $3 a copy for a million copies. Penguin then talks to their printer and for a million copies they can produce the book for $1 each copy so they say OK. Amazon then sells the book for $6 and everyone is happy, especially the consumer who did not have to pay the $12 cover price.

Groupon and their imitators, tend to offer group buying on services rather than goods.  For the most part the coupons are for spas, laser hair removal, restaurants, fitness classes and local attractions. The deal is "on" when enough people have purchased the coupon. The coupon companies take up to 50% of the face value of the coupon.

Groupon says it is "a city guide, a social tool and the best way to experience your city without paying full price." It is unlikely that it matters to either the coupon company or the service provider if the deal sells to one person or to 250 people.

The service provider will not be able to benefit from scale of service as they have not been able to produce their service more cheaply and capitalize on volume. The benefit to the service provider is break even, coupons not being redeemed and advertising exposure to new customers. For many of the service providers it is a money loser.

Let's turn our attention now to you and me - the consumer.  If you are savvy enough to have subscribed to Groupon, you have probably signed up for LivingSocial and Grooster and maybe a few others.

At this point however, coupon fatigue is setting in. Another mani/pedi deal? Another Laser Hair removal deal - how hairy do they think we are? More yoga deals in some difficult to get to location? As cheese shop and movie tickets deals get further and further apart, it is likely that we will see people unsubscribing and the sales begin to flatline and then fall off.

Where "service provider" couponing may be this year's big thing and next year's "no thing", group buying is a fantastic opportunity for companies that produce a consumer good.

Let's say you are a bike company like Norco, Brodie, Kona, Rocky Mountain or the always adorable, CCM from Canadian Tire.

You could offer your own group buying product - a 26 inch mountain bike with cromoly this and titanium that - for only $200 if 300 people plunk down their credit cards.

You can source that volume of parts for a much cheaper rate than you would normally get them for this bike that is specifically being made for this group.  4 weeks later you ship out the bikes to the new owners.  The new owners got an awesome deal, you sold bikes that only cost you $50 to make for $200, and you did not have to give $100 to a coupon company.

Now that's the way group buying should work! It would be nice to see this alternative approach develop in 2011 and offer real value to both consumers and manufacturer-retailers alike.

Make sure to check out Lisa's last blog post, Retailers and Group Coupons - Should you participate? One Gal's Opinion, for more information on the Group Coupon Phenomenon.

(Above image from: http://www.letsdeal.se/)

  

There is big buzz on the internet these days about Geolocation.  Wikipedia says:
"Geolocation is the identification of the real-world geographic location of an object, such as a cell phone or an Internet-connected computer terminal. Geolocation may refer to the practice of assessing the location, or to the actual assessed location."

From an internet marketing and mobile marketing aspect, geolocation is about identifying where you are and then filtering data so you get information that relevant to you.

Mobile apps such as FourSquare and Yelp utilize the GPS information from your cell phone to make recommendations about businesses around you.

Services such as Groupon (the group coupon phenom) have you choose the city that you want to receive deals from.

In the old days (last year or the year before), the country code domain extensions were one way to experience geolocation. When you go to bell.ca or sainsburys.co.uk you know which country that company is providing services for. .ca also had the ability to break the name down into provinces - sk.ca, bc.ca, on.ca and so on.

Now here's what I was thinking - let's take geolocation in domain names a step further. Let's say I have a small business in Portland or Vancouver. I have my .com or my .ca but I want to dominate my market. It would be nice to refine my location even further by using city names. But typing joesflowers.vancouver or decksrus.portland would drive most users bonkers.

I suggest that we take all those delightful airport codes that we know and love, and turn them into high performing domain extensions. Vancouver is YVR and Portland is PDX and that would give us Joesflowers.yvr and decksrus.pdx. Neat!

If you want to be the king of coffee for St. Anthony's Newfoundland then coffeeking.yay is the answer. Farnborough UK is your estate agencies patch? Priemierestates.fab is just the ticket.

So SFOites, YYZ peeps and JFKsters, stand up and say "I ♥ my airport code" and maybe ICANN will listen.

(Image: We borrowed this terrific image of airport code patches from the super cool SternLab. Read the related blog post here.)

There is a new game in town and the name of that game is Group Coupons.

Group Coupons is an email subscriber based system of offering deep discounts on a product to consumers ONLY if enough people purchase the coupon.

The major player in this market is Groupon. Groupon started in 2008 and has really taken off in late 2009 and now 2010. Their success has bred a host of new players such as Grooster, Good News, Living Social and Ethical Deal.

The group coupon value to the consumer is clear - half price or better on goods and service. The value to the retailer is a little less clear.

If you have a good, say jewelry, and you normally sell it for $50, the likelihood is that you paid $25 for it. Now you offer a Group Coupon of "$50 of jewelry for $25". Your coupon company takes half the $25 collected from the consumer and you get the other $12.50. That is a clear loss of $12.50 to you.

When faced with the math, Group Coupons look like a bad deal for retailers.

But you can mitigate that loss. What if you only offer your highest margin product? You paid $10 for Object A. You regularly sell it for $80. You coupon it for $40 - you get $20 and you still make $10.

You could make a decision to go for the loss.  You know the true value to your company is that the email went out to 40,000 or more consumers and then it got posted on Twitter and Facebook and the email got forwarded around to non subscribers. None of these people ever knew you existed and now they do.

Yesterday I got the Groupon for a cheese shop. I had a conversation at lunch with a friend who works in my building and we were talking about food and he said "I got this thing forwarded to me today about a deal on cheese".  I said I knew and then we talked about the cheese shop and expensive yummy cheeses. That same day, I went to the beach after work with another friend and she said  "Did you see the Groupon today for the cheese shop?". Two friends who don't know each other both mentioned it to me and now we're contemplating a cheese tasting party. Now that's effective email marketing.

If you choose the loss, put a reasonable limit on how many coupons you are going to sell - say 40 or 50. I've seen a few of the spas hit 1400 coupons and I know it will take them ages to service all those people.  Will the experience be good enough to bring that consumer back again?  How will the coupon activity impact the spa's current clientele? Will everyone wind up with rushed appointments and difficulty booking their next appointment even a month in advance?

For Service businesses, I recommend a limit of 250 coupons. You know you can service that number without upsetting your staff or your current clientele.

Restaurants seem to be the big winners in Group Coupons.  Like the Entertainment Book, these Group Coupons get consumers to restaurants that they would not normally go to. Diners are going to spend more than the value of the coupon and the margins on food and alcohol are pretty good. Put a limit on the number of coupons that can be redeemed per table and add an expiry date for the coupon and you are good to go.

You may also want to factor in the "unredeemed" coupons. If you sell 1000 and only 700 get redeemed, it could make up for the loss. A friend said that she can't remember all of the Groupons that she has. She's got "unredeemed" written all over her.

In summary here are my recommendations for retailers and Group Coupons:

• There is a huge value in the email/viral marketing and getting to new consumers who have never heard of you.
• Retailers with low margins should limit their coupons to 40 or 50 - high margin retailers, the sky's the limit!
• Service based businesses should limit their coupons to 250.
• Restaurants should limit the number of coupons accepted per table and apply an expiry date.
• "Unredeemed" may mean money in your pocket.

Further Reading & Case Studies

Groupon marketing results study - Phillip Greenspun Blog

Shops grapple with fallout from group coupons - MSN.com

Digital Influence Index identifies Canadians as social media savvy but cautious about information found online

Study by Fleishman-Hillard Study

Consumers across the globe are embracing the Internet as a primary source of information, but Canadians are unique in their use of digital and social media. The 2010 Digital Influence Index, released in Canada by Fleishman-Hillard in conjunction with Harris Interactive, reveals that Canadians have high online engagement but a lower level of trust in the Internet.

The study also measures several key aspects of consumers' use of the Internet, from media consumption patterns, to the degree of adoption of various digital behaviours, to involvement in social networking. Now in its second year, the Index has expanded to include 48 per cent of the global online population, spanning the United States, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, China, Japan and Canada.

"Canadian consumers are comfortable yet cautious when it comes to using the Internet," said David Bradfield, senior partner and global chair of Fleishman-Hillard's digital practice. "We lead the world in social networking and call the Internet our most influential source of information. There's a gap though. While consumers migrate online, marketers aren't making the move to digital fast enough. They need to realign their marketing and communication programs or risk irrelevance in the consumers' mind."

The Digital Influence Index reveals the following key insights that set Canadian consumers apart from the rest of the world:

1. Internet Most Influential Medium: The Internet is the most important and influential form of media consumed by Canadians. Compared to the 37 per cent of Canadian consumers who say that newspapers are important to their lives, 52 per cent say that the Internet is most important. 
2. Canadians are Sociable: Sixty-nine per cent of Canadian consumers have a Facebook account, compared with the 47 per cent average across the seven countries. Though Canadians embrace social media, they are cautious about its use and how much they reveal about themselves.  
3. Canadians Seek Accuracy: In Canada, consumers are more likely to identify and follow a couple of trustworthy sources for the most accurate information on the Internet.
4. Cautiously Trusting: Canadians are most likely to seek advice from others when making a decision and value conversations with friends, families and co-workers when it comes to decision-making.
5. Twitter Know-how: Consumers in Canada are the most knowledgeable of microblogs but have low levels of trust in companies that microblog.
6. Pay to Play Doesn't Pay-off: Consumers call into question the truthfulness of an article written by a blogger if the blogger was given a free sample or was paid by a company.
7. Adopting Mobile Behaviours: Canada has a relatively low level of adopting many mobile digital behaviours compared with other mature markets (U.S., U.K, France, Germany and Japan).
8. Where to From Here: Although the Internet is already considered an influential medium, only 24 per cent of Canadians believe that it will have a greater influence on their decisions in the next two years.

Download a complimentary copy of the Digital Influence Index white paper and read in-depth analysis on global insights.

View video commentaries from some of the sector experts at Fleishman-Hillard Canada.

About the Digital Influence Index
The Digital Influence Index is a joint venture between Fleishman-Hillard and Harris Interactive. The project was designed and led by Fleishman-Hillard's digital research group, a team within the agency's network focused on providing research that supports the digital transformation of communications. Analysis and insight development was conducted in partnership with Harris Interactive.

The fieldwork for this study was also conducted by Harris Interactive through a comprehensive, 15-minute online survey among a representative sample of 4,243 Internet users in China, the United States, Canada, Japan, Germany, France and the United Kingdom.

This work took place between December 2009 and January 2010. Respondents to the survey were recruited from the various panels managed by Harris Interactive across the markets surveyed.

The data was weighted to online population targets, including those based on age, gender, education, region and Internet usage. Further weighting was applied to the analysis of the combined results to reflect the online population sizes in each country.

The Digital Influence Index was constructed by factoring in both consumption of a medium and the importance consumers attach to that consumption. Respondents were allowed to give various media a score out of 100 for the amount of time they spend on them and then rate how important this time is to their decisions. Consumption and importance were each scored out of 100 to produce a percentage score for each and a total score out of 200. This latter score is halved to produce a combined percentage score that sums up the influence of the medium.

About Fleishman-Hillard
Fleishman-Hillard Inc., one of the world's leading strategic communications firms, has built its reputation on creating integrated solutions that deliver what its clients value most: meaningful, positive and measurable impact on the performance of their organizations. The firm is widely recognized for excellent client service and a strong company culture founded on teamwork, integrity and personal commitment. Based in St. Louis, the firm operates throughout North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Middle East, Africa and Latin America through its 80 owned offices. For more information, visit the Fleishman-Hillard website at www.fleishmanhillard.com.

About Harris Interactive
Harris Interactive is one of the world's leading custom market research firms, leveraging research, technology, and business acumen to transform relevant insight into actionable foresight. Known widely for the Harris Poll and for pioneering innovative research methodologies, Harris offers expertise in a wide range of industries including healthcare, technology, public affairs, energy, telecommunications, financial services, insurance, media, retail, restaurant, and consumer package goods. Serving clients in over 215 countries and territories through our North American, European, and Asian offices and a network of independent market research firms, Harris specializes in delivering research solutions that help us - and our clients - stay ahead of what's next. For more information, please visit www.harrisinteractive.com.