Friday, September 3, 2010
Monday, December 21, 2009
Friday, December 18, 2009
Mobile Phones Become Essential Tool for Holiday Shopping
The mobile phone is quickly becoming Santa’s biggest helper.
Peter DaSilva for The New York Times
While shopping at Bloomingdale’s in San Francisco, Michael Robison scans bar codes with ShopSavvy, a price comparison application, on the T-Mobile G1 smartphone.
Peter DaSilva for The New York Times
Michael Robison uses an application called ShopSavvy to find deals, but he doesn't always go for the product that cost less.
»
Powerful software applications for devices like the Apple iPhone are making it easy for bargain-hunting consumers to see if another retailer is offering a better deal on a big-screen HDTV or pair of shoes and to use it to haggle at the cash register.
Online retailers are revamping the mobile versions of their sites so consumers can make purchases without tedious typing. And offline retailers, battling for every last dollar, are sending cellphone users electronic coupons to lure them away from competitors.
One in five shoppers said they intended to use their cellphones to shop this holiday season, according to an annual survey by Deloitte, the accounting and consulting firm. Of those, 45 percent said they would use their phone to research prices, 32 percent said they would use it to find coupons or read reviews and 25 percent said they would make purchases from their phones.
“We are at the cusp of this technology really driving a lot of activity during the shopping season,” said Stacy Janiak, United States retail practice leader at Deloitte. “It is both an opportunity and a challenge for a retailer, because you can have a consumer who can cross-shop your store with other bricks-and-mortar stores or online, all from the convenience of your aisle.”
Heather Reed, a mother in Cypress, Tex., is one of those mobile power-shoppers. She uses several apps on her Samsung Moment phone to whittle down her spending. She was recently considering a $29.99 Hot Wheels video game for her son at Wal-Mart. With a quick scan of the bar code, an application called ShopSavvy found it at Target, just across the freeway, for $19.99. Another app from MyCoupons.com provided a Target coupon that sliced off $10 more.
“It went from $29.99 to $9.99, all in five minutes, no searching the Internet or spending hours trying to find a deal or a coupon,” she said. “It’s all right there in your hand.”
Of course, mobile shopping technology is still somewhat clunky, between erratic Internet connections, outdated pricing data and balky product scanners.
But smarter phones and a heightened bargain-consciousness among consumers are spurring a level of innovation in e-commerce last seen during the height of the dot-com boom a decade ago.
In addition to ShopSavvy, mobile apps from RedLaser, TheFind, ShopStyle and PriceGrabber.com allow customers to compare prices across a range of retailers. Retrevo, an electronics review site, has a service called RetrevoQ that lets users send a text or Twitter message with the name of the product they are considering and get an immediate response with a recommendation of whether to buy it and a range of online prices.
While searching for prices is easy, buying from the screen of a cellphone is more difficult. It generally involves clicking to the retailer’s Web site, which is often not customized for a mobile phone’s tiny screen, and then entering shipping and billing information using the tiny keyboard.
To fix that, some retailers are building sites and applications specifically for cellphones. The iPhone app for the Tommy Hilfiger online store, for instance, shows select products based on what shoppers are looking for so they do not have to scroll through pages of clothes. Those who are registered on the Web site need only enter their e-mail address and password to check out.
“Retailers need to realize that if you give people a way to make it easy, people will shop on their phones,” said Kelly O’Neill, product marketing director for ATG, which provides e-commerce technology to retailers and built Tommy Hilfiger’s app.
EBay’s iPhone app sends people notifications if they are outbid in an auction and lets people check out with just a few clicks if they have a PayPal account. Mobile shoppers will spend $500 million on eBay this year, the company said.
By improving ease of use, savvy online retailers are snatching sales from bricks-and-mortar ones. Matthew Tractenberg, for example, was recently shopping in a Silicon Valley bookstore, where he picked out five books for a total of $80. Before taking them to the counter, he typed the titles into the Amazon app on his BlackBerry Curve. Amazon had the books for $50 and would not charge sales tax or shipping. He placed the order on the spot and left his small pile of books in the store.
“It’s almost easier than doing it on a computer,” Mr. Tractenberg said.
Offline retailers are feeling the pain. Armed with competitive price information, shoppers are haggling as never before.
Although most stores refuse to match prices, especially from Web retailers, it is difficult to simply allow a customer brandishing a lower price to walk out the door.
Best Buy, for example, officially says it will not match prices of online electronics retailers and will match offline prices only if the customer brings in an ad or receipt. But several ShopSavvy users report having luck getting individual stores to match prices they find using the app.
Pacific Sunwear, a clothing and accessories retailer, said it would match lower prices found in stores or online. According to Chad Petrillo, a clerk at the chain’s San Francisco store, more people have been showing him competing prices on their phones, most often for shoes. The store will honor them after calling the other store to verify the price, he said.
For most shoppers, price is only one factor, to be weighed against the time it takes to drive to another store or wait for a Web site to ship an item. That could be a boon for offline stores, according to Ron Levi, vice president of products at TheFind, a shopping comparison Web site. “Your proximity to that retailer gives them an advantage,” he said. “It’s theirs to lose.”
Michael Robison, a Coast Guard petty officer from Guernewood Park, Calif., routinely uses ShopSavvy to check prices, but that doesn’t mean he always goes with the lowest one. He just bought a Victorinox laptop case for $45 at Macy’s, even though it was $30 at eBags. For that amount of money, “I would much rather walk out with it than wait,” he said.
Another problem with the mobile apps is accuracy. When Mr. Robison scanned a Nintendo hand-held gaming device at Radio Shack recently, ShopSavvy told him he could get it for $110 online instead of paying $170 at the store. When he got home, he discovered that online bargain was for a used machine.
Aware of the power of mobile phones, some offline retailers are using the technology to fight back.
If someone standing in one store scans a product with ShopSavvy, for example, a retailer down the street could deliver the shopper a coupon for the same item. A major retailer is already doing that in a few test cities, including Seattle, said Alexander Muse, co-founder of Big in Japan, the start-up that created ShopSavvy.
Other applications, including Yowza, use the GPS location information in cellphones to send shoppers coupons for stores within walking distance of where they’re standing.
“This empowers consumers to make a smart decision,” Mr. Muse said. “Already, retailers are starting to figure out, ‘I need to be in this game.’ ”
Peter DaSilva for The New York Times
While shopping at Bloomingdale’s in San Francisco, Michael Robison scans bar codes with ShopSavvy, a price comparison application, on the T-Mobile G1 smartphone.
Peter DaSilva for The New York Times
Michael Robison uses an application called ShopSavvy to find deals, but he doesn't always go for the product that cost less.
»
Powerful software applications for devices like the Apple iPhone are making it easy for bargain-hunting consumers to see if another retailer is offering a better deal on a big-screen HDTV or pair of shoes and to use it to haggle at the cash register.
Online retailers are revamping the mobile versions of their sites so consumers can make purchases without tedious typing. And offline retailers, battling for every last dollar, are sending cellphone users electronic coupons to lure them away from competitors.
One in five shoppers said they intended to use their cellphones to shop this holiday season, according to an annual survey by Deloitte, the accounting and consulting firm. Of those, 45 percent said they would use their phone to research prices, 32 percent said they would use it to find coupons or read reviews and 25 percent said they would make purchases from their phones.
“We are at the cusp of this technology really driving a lot of activity during the shopping season,” said Stacy Janiak, United States retail practice leader at Deloitte. “It is both an opportunity and a challenge for a retailer, because you can have a consumer who can cross-shop your store with other bricks-and-mortar stores or online, all from the convenience of your aisle.”
Heather Reed, a mother in Cypress, Tex., is one of those mobile power-shoppers. She uses several apps on her Samsung Moment phone to whittle down her spending. She was recently considering a $29.99 Hot Wheels video game for her son at Wal-Mart. With a quick scan of the bar code, an application called ShopSavvy found it at Target, just across the freeway, for $19.99. Another app from MyCoupons.com provided a Target coupon that sliced off $10 more.
“It went from $29.99 to $9.99, all in five minutes, no searching the Internet or spending hours trying to find a deal or a coupon,” she said. “It’s all right there in your hand.”
Of course, mobile shopping technology is still somewhat clunky, between erratic Internet connections, outdated pricing data and balky product scanners.
But smarter phones and a heightened bargain-consciousness among consumers are spurring a level of innovation in e-commerce last seen during the height of the dot-com boom a decade ago.
In addition to ShopSavvy, mobile apps from RedLaser, TheFind, ShopStyle and PriceGrabber.com allow customers to compare prices across a range of retailers. Retrevo, an electronics review site, has a service called RetrevoQ that lets users send a text or Twitter message with the name of the product they are considering and get an immediate response with a recommendation of whether to buy it and a range of online prices.
While searching for prices is easy, buying from the screen of a cellphone is more difficult. It generally involves clicking to the retailer’s Web site, which is often not customized for a mobile phone’s tiny screen, and then entering shipping and billing information using the tiny keyboard.
To fix that, some retailers are building sites and applications specifically for cellphones. The iPhone app for the Tommy Hilfiger online store, for instance, shows select products based on what shoppers are looking for so they do not have to scroll through pages of clothes. Those who are registered on the Web site need only enter their e-mail address and password to check out.
“Retailers need to realize that if you give people a way to make it easy, people will shop on their phones,” said Kelly O’Neill, product marketing director for ATG, which provides e-commerce technology to retailers and built Tommy Hilfiger’s app.
EBay’s iPhone app sends people notifications if they are outbid in an auction and lets people check out with just a few clicks if they have a PayPal account. Mobile shoppers will spend $500 million on eBay this year, the company said.
By improving ease of use, savvy online retailers are snatching sales from bricks-and-mortar ones. Matthew Tractenberg, for example, was recently shopping in a Silicon Valley bookstore, where he picked out five books for a total of $80. Before taking them to the counter, he typed the titles into the Amazon app on his BlackBerry Curve. Amazon had the books for $50 and would not charge sales tax or shipping. He placed the order on the spot and left his small pile of books in the store.
“It’s almost easier than doing it on a computer,” Mr. Tractenberg said.
Offline retailers are feeling the pain. Armed with competitive price information, shoppers are haggling as never before.
Although most stores refuse to match prices, especially from Web retailers, it is difficult to simply allow a customer brandishing a lower price to walk out the door.
Best Buy, for example, officially says it will not match prices of online electronics retailers and will match offline prices only if the customer brings in an ad or receipt. But several ShopSavvy users report having luck getting individual stores to match prices they find using the app.
Pacific Sunwear, a clothing and accessories retailer, said it would match lower prices found in stores or online. According to Chad Petrillo, a clerk at the chain’s San Francisco store, more people have been showing him competing prices on their phones, most often for shoes. The store will honor them after calling the other store to verify the price, he said.
For most shoppers, price is only one factor, to be weighed against the time it takes to drive to another store or wait for a Web site to ship an item. That could be a boon for offline stores, according to Ron Levi, vice president of products at TheFind, a shopping comparison Web site. “Your proximity to that retailer gives them an advantage,” he said. “It’s theirs to lose.”
Michael Robison, a Coast Guard petty officer from Guernewood Park, Calif., routinely uses ShopSavvy to check prices, but that doesn’t mean he always goes with the lowest one. He just bought a Victorinox laptop case for $45 at Macy’s, even though it was $30 at eBags. For that amount of money, “I would much rather walk out with it than wait,” he said.
Another problem with the mobile apps is accuracy. When Mr. Robison scanned a Nintendo hand-held gaming device at Radio Shack recently, ShopSavvy told him he could get it for $110 online instead of paying $170 at the store. When he got home, he discovered that online bargain was for a used machine.
Aware of the power of mobile phones, some offline retailers are using the technology to fight back.
If someone standing in one store scans a product with ShopSavvy, for example, a retailer down the street could deliver the shopper a coupon for the same item. A major retailer is already doing that in a few test cities, including Seattle, said Alexander Muse, co-founder of Big in Japan, the start-up that created ShopSavvy.
Other applications, including Yowza, use the GPS location information in cellphones to send shoppers coupons for stores within walking distance of where they’re standing.
“This empowers consumers to make a smart decision,” Mr. Muse said. “Already, retailers are starting to figure out, ‘I need to be in this game.’ ”
THE IMPORTANCE OF CELL PHONES IN MODERN SOCIETY
Cell phones have become a necessity for many people throughout the world. The ability to keep in touch with family, business associates, and access to email are only a few of the reasons for the increasing importance of cell phones. Today's technically advanced cell phones are capable of not only receiving and placing phone calls, but storing data, taking pictures, and can even be used as walkie talkies, to name just a few of the available options.
When cell phones were first introduced to the public, they were bulky, expensive, and some even required a base unit that had to be transported along with the phone. Good reception was a major problem and in general, early cell phones could only be used in certain locations were the signal was particularly strong. As cell phone technology advanced, the difficult in using them became less of a problem. Today, cell phone reception has improved greatly due to the use of satellites and wireless services. As cell phones improved and became simple to use, the importance of cell phones increased accordingly.
Cell phones are the perfect way to stay connected with others and provide the user with a sense of security. In the event of emergency, having a cell phone can allow help to reach you quickly and could possibly save lives. However, the importance of cell phones goes way beyond personal safety. Modern cell phones are capable of internet access, sending and receiving photos and files, and some cell phones are equipped with GPS technology, allowing for use in most locations around the world and allowing the cell phone to be found or the user located in the event of loss or emergency.
Cell phone reception has become reliable and of high quality due to advances in wireless technology. Wireless service providers offer excellent packages and promotions for cell phone users. Finding a dependable service provider is no longer an issue for cell phone users. The expansion of the wireless service provider industry gives cell phone users a choice and the increased competition has caused a drop in prices of wireless cell phone service. The importance of cell phones goes way beyond the ability to make or receive phone calls. Cell phone users can instantly send data to the home or office, check for important email, use their cell phone as a PDA or calendar, and store photos which can be easily transferred to a PC or laptop computer.
Cell phone manufacturers have produced a wide range of cell phones, which sell for prices that range from very inexpensive to over one thousand dollars. The available options give users the choice of purchasing a basic cell phone to use simply for making calls, or choosing a complex, technologically advanced cell phone that can perform as many or even more tasks that a home computer. Over the past decade, the increasing importance of cell phones has made them almost a necessity for most people. Even remote and underdeveloped countries have some access to cell phone technology and wireless services.
The importance of cell phones has increased the competition in the wireless service provider industry, making cell phones very affordable and very easy to use. Cell phones have become almost a status symbol in addition to the convenience and security that comes from owning them.
Keith Kingston is a professional web publisher, offering information on cheap cell phones and Motorola cell phones [http://www.cell-phones-365.com/]
Article Source: [http://EzineArticles.com/?The-Importance-Of-Cell-Phones-In-Modern-Society&id=7446] The Importance Of Cell Phones In Modern Society
When cell phones were first introduced to the public, they were bulky, expensive, and some even required a base unit that had to be transported along with the phone. Good reception was a major problem and in general, early cell phones could only be used in certain locations were the signal was particularly strong. As cell phone technology advanced, the difficult in using them became less of a problem. Today, cell phone reception has improved greatly due to the use of satellites and wireless services. As cell phones improved and became simple to use, the importance of cell phones increased accordingly.
Cell phones are the perfect way to stay connected with others and provide the user with a sense of security. In the event of emergency, having a cell phone can allow help to reach you quickly and could possibly save lives. However, the importance of cell phones goes way beyond personal safety. Modern cell phones are capable of internet access, sending and receiving photos and files, and some cell phones are equipped with GPS technology, allowing for use in most locations around the world and allowing the cell phone to be found or the user located in the event of loss or emergency.
Cell phone reception has become reliable and of high quality due to advances in wireless technology. Wireless service providers offer excellent packages and promotions for cell phone users. Finding a dependable service provider is no longer an issue for cell phone users. The expansion of the wireless service provider industry gives cell phone users a choice and the increased competition has caused a drop in prices of wireless cell phone service. The importance of cell phones goes way beyond the ability to make or receive phone calls. Cell phone users can instantly send data to the home or office, check for important email, use their cell phone as a PDA or calendar, and store photos which can be easily transferred to a PC or laptop computer.
Cell phone manufacturers have produced a wide range of cell phones, which sell for prices that range from very inexpensive to over one thousand dollars. The available options give users the choice of purchasing a basic cell phone to use simply for making calls, or choosing a complex, technologically advanced cell phone that can perform as many or even more tasks that a home computer. Over the past decade, the increasing importance of cell phones has made them almost a necessity for most people. Even remote and underdeveloped countries have some access to cell phone technology and wireless services.
The importance of cell phones has increased the competition in the wireless service provider industry, making cell phones very affordable and very easy to use. Cell phones have become almost a status symbol in addition to the convenience and security that comes from owning them.
Keith Kingston is a professional web publisher, offering information on cheap cell phones and Motorola cell phones [http://www.cell-phones-365.com/]
Article Source: [http://EzineArticles.com/?The-Importance-Of-Cell-Phones-In-Modern-Society&id=7446] The Importance Of Cell Phones In Modern Society
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