Marketing

A year ago, AOL decided to consolidate its various advertising platforms on one Web page. Platform-A was born, followed by a fully integrated sales force and, more recently, a newly designed home page. Since the redesign, advertising click-through rates on the primary ad banner rose 30 percent. Site...

A year ago, AOL decided to consolidate its various advertising platforms on one Web page. Platform-A was born, followed by a fully integrated sales force and, more recently, a newly designed home page. Since the redesign, advertising click-through rates on the primary ad banner rose 30 percent. Site...

Warren Royal sells bobblehead dolls over the Internet. It's a specific product that demands a specific address for Internet shoppers. So, when Royal decided to get into the burgeoning bobblehead business, he decided the best way to break through the clutter of online bobblehead buyers and sellers wo...

Legend has it that the inventor of chess was so wise that when the king asked him to name his reward, he replied that he only wanted one grain of wheat for the first square, two grains for the second, four grains for the third, eight grains for the fourth and so on up to the sixty-four squares on th...

As e-commerce gets more sophisticated and consumer expectations continue to rise, many retailers are considering prettying up their existing Web sites with improved graphics or new features in order to make them more attractive to consumers. While such enhancements can make your site more appealing ...

It is no secret that "retail therapy" -- whether in the form of shopping at a designer boutique, visiting a favorite online retailer, or even purchasing a preferred brand of shampoo from the grocery store -- can evoke feelings of happiness and well-being. A fascinating new study by marketing guru M...

Warner Music Group has started pulling some of its songs from YouTube, a move that apparently reflects a breakdown in the renegotiation of a licensing agreement between the two sides. Warner licensed its entire music catalog to YouTube just before the latter was acquired by search engine powerhouse ...

Microsoft is giving PC makers -- essentially, companies that make build-to-suit computers -- an additional four months to buy the Windows XP operating system. Redmond had originally designated Jan. 21, 2009, as the cutoff for shipping the OS. Now, these manufacturers can take delivery up to May 30.

In the summer of 1865, newspaper editor Horace Greeley offered this advice to a nation just then beginning to recover from the Civil War: "Go West, young man, go West and grow up with the country." As America begins to recover from recent economic challenges, Greeley's best advice to merchants in 20...

Social media outsourcing will be the next big business opportunity for India after business process outsourcing and knowledge process outsourcing, contends Gaurav Mishra, Yahoo fellow in residence at Georgetown University's Institute for the Study of Diplomacy. "Some functions are best handled by a ...

Google: The name conjures up images of a brilliant company, one able to anticipate customer desires and consistently deliver leading-edge technology more effectively than competitors. Having captured and kept a commanding lead in desktop search, Google has now set its sights on cell phones and mobil...

Even sophisticated ad buyers can make mistakes: ignoring target demographics' tastes and sensibilities; using archaic assumptions when measuring the success of an online campaign; and failing to plan for follow-up activities such as fulfillment. Those are fairly basic errors. There are also some sub...

The familiar social media paradigm of "Listen ... Learn ... Engage ... Earn" has a correlative imperative: "Publish or Perish," and enterprises probably need to find someone else to do the job for them. But be really careful about whom you select. I've covered the specifics of B2B digital media rela...

Maybe you've seen more of them during your Christmas shopping jaunts at the neighborhood mall this holiday season than you did last year; people using smartphones while in stores to do Web searches on products, price comparisons, or even to place orders. It's a sight that Google hopes will soon be a...

A few weeks ago, Johnson & Johnson presented the blogosphere with an ad for its brand name pain reliever Motrin that was aimed at mothers who were experiencing back pain from carrying their babies around in slings. The backlash was swift. The ad struck many viewers as having a tone that mocked, ...