ChoiceStream

A House bill has been introduced that would require companies to get Web surfers' permission to collect sensitive information--health, finances--or share less sensitive (but still personal) information with third parties. It would require an opt-out regime for other personal information collection. The bill, dubbed the "Best Practices Act," was introduced by Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Ill.), chairman of the House Commerce Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade, and Consumer Protection. The bill will be discussed at a hearing this Thursday. According to a briefing memo on the bill, "The purpose of this bill is to foster transparency about the commercial use of personal information and provide consumers with meaningful choices about the collection, use, and disclosure of such information.” The bill would require companies to provide "concise, meaningful, timely, prominent, and easy-to-understand notice to users about their privacy policies, including what information is being collected and why. Among the criticisms of current online privacy policies is that they are buried inside lengthy statements.
Read the full article at Broadcasting & Cable

Whether consumers visit a site to make a purchase, use their mobile devices to conduct research, or place a call to a contact center with a question, when it comes to delivering a positive "commerce anywhere" customer experience today's etailers and online marketers need to be able to flow content and context across all channels with ease. Quite simply, as e-commerce has come of age, retailers have discovered that the more unique and rich their product content is, the better their storefronts perform in terms of conversions, reductions in return rates and desired customer outcomes. Improving usability and adding features to counter the competition -- from sizing charts, images and video, feature lists, color swatches and recommendations in the form of cross-sell and up-sell options to customer-generated reviews, ratings, tags and categorization -- have led to the rapid growth of online retail sites in a highly dynamic environment. To read more about this trend in ecommerce, click the link above.Read the full article at Electronic Commerce Time

Back-to-school spending is expected to increase as much as 16% over last year, even as parents continue the bargain-hunting trend that began during the recession, according to a survey from NRF and BIGresearch. A significant number of survey respondents said they plan to buy more store-brand and generic products, and more than half said they plan to shop at department stores including Macy's, J.C. Penney and Kohl's. "We are encouraged by the fact that parents are eager to start their back-to-school shopping this year, but the industry still remains cautiously optimistic about recovery," said NRF President and CEO Matt Shay.
Read the full article at Business Week

Wall Street is notorious for not learning from its mistakes. Maybe machines can do better. That is the hope of an increasing number of investors who are turning to the science of artificial intelligence to make investment decisions. With artificial intelligence, programmers don't just set up computers to make decisions in response to certain inputs. They attempt to enable the systems to learn from decisions, and adapt. Most investors trying the approach are using "machine learning," a branch of artificial intelligence in which a computer program analyzes huge chunks of data and makes predictions about the future. It is used by tech companies such as Google to match Web searches with results and NetFlix to predict which movies users are likely to rent. One upstart in the AI race on Wall Street is Rebellion Research, a tiny New York hedge fund with about $7 million in capital that has been using a machine-learning program it developed to invest in stocks. Run by a small team of twentysomething math and computer whizzes, Rebellion has a solid track record, topping the S&P 500-stock index by an average of 10% a year since its 2007 launch. "It's pretty clear that human beings aren't improving," said Spencer Greenberg, 27 years old and the brains behind Rebellion's AI system. "But computers and algorithms are only getting faster and more robust." To read more about Rebellion and advances in AI in general, click the link above.Read the full article at The Wall Street Journal

When BigCommerce later this month flips the switch activating the latest version of its e-commerce platform, delivered through the software-as-a-service model, all 6,000 of its merchant clients will have mobile-optimized versions of their e-commerce sites. BigCommerce clients’ m-commerce sites will be optimized for the iPhone, iPad, BlackBerry, Palm Pre and Android mobile devices. Consumers who tap in a BigCommerce retailer client’s web site address into their phones will be directed to the mobile-optimized version of the retailer’s site; consumers coming to the sites via other mobile devices will be directed to the conventional e-commerce site. This confirms a major trend in m-commerce: e-commerce vendors adding m-commerce functionality to their platforms and launching the new functionality with a huge number of their retailer clients. “It’s very clear: People are not just shopping from their desks anymore,” says Mitchell Harper of BigCommerce. “They could be on a bus or a train, or sitting in a theater waiting for a movie to start. They literally can be anywhere. And people browsing the mobile web now expect to see a version of a web site that looks good and works well on their phones. If they don’t see what they expect, they will think your business has fallen behind, and that can really damage your credibility.”Read the full article

Americans will spend 9% more with companies that provide excellent customer service, according to recent data from American Express. A majority of Americans report that quality customer service is more important to them in today’s economic environment (61%) and will spend an average of 9% more when they believe a company provides excellent service. Not surprisingly, nine in ten Americans (91%) consider the level of customer service important when deciding to do business with a company. But only one-quarter believe companies value their business and will go the extra mile to keep it. Most consumers feel businesses can do more to retain their loyalty. Contrary to conventional wisdom, customers are more inclined to talk about a positive experience than complain about a negative one. Three-quarters (75%) are very likely to speak positively about a company after a good service experience in contrast with 59% who are very likely to speak negatively about a company after poor service.Read the full article

Half of U.S. consumers have made an in-store or telephone purchase after receiving a promotional email, according to a new study from digital marketing firm e-Dialog. e-Dialog advises retailers to capitalize on the generally high offline promotional email conversion rates with cross-channel initiatives such as honoring email discounts in stores and in call centers. In the U.S., 51% of consumers are more likely to make an in-store purchase as a result of a marketing email, with 42% less likely to buy and 4% not affected. To better capitalize on email’s impact on customer likelihood to make in-store purchases, e-Dialog recommends retailers capture customer email addresses at the point of purchase, with incentives for employees to do so. Read the full article at Retailer Daily

A new study from GfK Consumer titled "Future Buy" reports that a full 31% of the U.S. population now falls into a category it calls "the Xtreme Shopper," characterized by the amount of time they devote to finding the best deals on everything. "It's not so much that these shoppers do anything that different than other consumers," Lew Paine, VP/Gfk Consumer, tells Marketing Daily, such as relying on Internet research, especially through mobile devices, using multiple retail channels, and checking product reviews. "It's just that this 31% do so much more of it. They are using many more touchpoints and more resources. They visit more Web sites, and are more likely to participate in online communities." Another third of customers, he says, exhibit many of the same behaviors, but less frequently. And the remaining third -- a group he calls traditionalists -- tend to shop the way they always have.Read the full article at MediaPost

Building brand loyalty in retail is even more important as today’s consumers cope with tighter budgets, busier lifestyles and, in many cases, shorter attention spans. Technology such as kiosks, smart phones and social media tools can dramatically boost brand loyalty when used properly. But that begs a big question: Which devices and communication channels work best to entice consumers and keep them coming back for more? According to a recent study on consumer behavior by BuzzBack Market Research, a large majority of North American shoppers prefer retailers that enable them to shop consistently across multiple channels using devices such as kiosks, smart phones and social media tools. More than 80% of consumers surveyed said they want more control over where, when and how they interact with retailers — whether through Facebook accounts, iPhones or in-store kiosks. NCR’s Dusty Lutz said, "A new generation of consumers craves more personalization and control over when and how they interact with retailers. Consumers are willing to reward retailers that enable a seamless, converged channel experience across Web, store or mobile channels. Retailers are responding by evaluating technology solutions that help them interact with shoppers based on their individual preferences and location to create a more compelling shopping experience."Read the full article

Online consumers generally prefer online-only internet retailers, according to a new study from The Nielsen Company. Data from “Global Trends in Online Shopping” indicates that worldwide, 34% of online consumers say they primarily do their internet shopping at retailers that have only an online presence (such as Amazon.com), followed by 20% of respondents who prefer sites that also have traditional “brick and mortar” stores and those that allow customers to select products from many different online stores. Only 16% of respondents globally indicate they have never shopped online. In a sign that there remains tremendous room for growth in online retailing, 44% of online consumers globally say they spend less than 5% of their monthly spending online, and 29% say they spend between 6-10%. Read the full article at Retailer Daily